The objective of this proposal is to investigate the potential of non-formal education in addressing educational disparities, specifically through the examination of Territorial Pacts and to analyse some case studies.

There are various types of Pacts that have gained popularity in educational settings, moving from Community Pacts to Educational Community Pacts (Boeris, 2018). The latter has been strongly supported by the Italian Government School Plan in the 2020/21 and 2021/22 academic years, even during the ongoing pandemic crisis (Ministero dell’Istruzione, 2020; Ministero dell’Istruzione 2021).

These bottom-up practices aim to establish a strong social connection between the school and the surrounding territory. The pandemic has highlighted the importance of this connection. It is essential to form an alliance between the school, the territory, and third-sector entities to strengthen the educating community and guide students in their growth (Locatelli, 2021).

In recent times, there have been numerous instances of Pacts in Italy that demonstrate how these mechanisms can actually result in an increase in social welfare. This presents Pacts as a valuable tool that can be utilized by schools and local authorities to promote social justice (Balzano, 2019).

In this regard, the signing of a Territorial Pact compels the parties involved to consider the needs of the territory in which their actions will take place (Balduzzi, 2012). In a democratic manner, the participants in the Pact choose the intervention to be implemented, taking into account the needs of the community.

The students participating in the Pact collaborate with teachers and local associations to decide where to direct their efforts. The resulting care work will involve taking responsibility for a place that is significant to the students (Margiotta, 2015). The social justice aspect of this lies in the student's ability to decide for themselves what care work to implement for the benefit of the entire community.

The outcome of the student's efforts will be returned to the community. By doing so, the Pact mechanism enables students to experience a social justice process that shows them that collective action can lead to a benefit that the entire community can enjoy, and to create a new model of a more universalist school (Mangione, Chipa, Cannella, 2022).

Education has an important role in the formation of individuals and the constitution of society. Through educational processes, in fact, each person expresses himself and makes use of his abilities, and at the same time builds and refines them, thus enabling both the transmission of culture and social reproduction.

Starting with an analysis of certain aspects of the critical pedagogy of Paulo Freire, who can be considered the forerunner of social justice education, we will examine whether it is possible to say that social justice education is simultaneously a social, educational and political approach of a country and whether the dynamics inherent in social justice processes also characterise the so-called social justice education approach.

This work aims, therefore, to examine the importance of the application of the social justice education approach in contemporary society and to achieve this goal, the starting point will be the theoretical framing of the relationship between social justice and educational practice (praxis), highlighting the need to place the human being and his cultural dimension at the centre of educational processes, to then go on to examine some cases of application of the social justice education approach – on the educational model proposed by Freire – within the educational system in Europe and Latin America.

Educational poverty is a central topic of academic debate and national and european agenda-setting. As shown by Giancola & Salmieri (2023), several authors have addressed the issue of definition and construction of the concept of educational poverty (e.g. Checchi 1998; Allmendinger & Leibfried 2003; Barbieri & Cipollone 2007; Save the Children 2014; Nanni & Pellegrino 2018), developing narratives on the relationship between educational poverty and skills, often seen only as performance (e.g. reading, mathematics, science, problem solving, financial literacy) and not as social capabilities (Sen 1999; Nussbaum 2006).

On the other hand, the fight against educational poverty represents one of the principles of action of those realities part of the paradigm/movement of popular education. The core of these action principles is grounded in addressing educational inequalities (Secci 2017), promoting social justice, and empowering marginalized groups and individuals who are excluded from the formal education system (Kohan 2014). Thus, this paradigm/movement is based on emancipatory purposes, even if expressed in terms of social mobility or creation of social utopias (Vittoria 2014; Secci 2017).

The present work aims to explore representations, meanings, and discursive practices connected to the concept of educational poverty produced by popular educators within educational circuits external to the formal education system. In particular, the analysis is focused on the discursive practices (re)produced by popular educators within the ‘Rete Delle Scuole Popolari di Roma’, a coordination tool of the popular schools of Rome created in 2020.

The analytical approach adopted for the analysis is inspired by Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and by interpretative paradigm. According to the CDA, language and, more specifically, discourses are understood as "social practices" (Wodak & Meyer, 2009) constitutive and conditioning at once the context in which they develop (Fairclough & Wodak, 1997). Through in-depth interviews with educators involved in popular schools of this circuit external to the formal education system, the research reveals representations, discourses, and meanings of the concepts conveyed by the educators of this circuit. The interviews are analysed through an interpretative approach, which highlights normative and cognitive representations that compose or shape the social paradigm (Jenson 1989, Surel 2000), within which the popular educators of the ‘Rete Delle Scuole Popolari di Roma’ circuit operate.

Last, the research tries to highlight differences and convergences between interpretations, representations and discursive practices of these actors, as well as their theoretical frameworks, and the dimensions used to conceptualize educational poverty in the academic field, in national and international institutes (e.g. INVALSI, OECD) and in the data built to measure it in the different surveys (e.g. PISA, PIAAC, TIMSS, PIRLS). This allows us on the one hand to reflect on the role that popular schools play today in their relationship with formal education system and its changes (Verger, Fontdevila & Zancajo 2016; Vittadini 2016; Ball 2021); on the other, to question the academic debate about the conceptualization of educational poverty and the construction of the data through which to measure it, that orient the frame of public policies on the issue of educational poverty.