Conference Program

Current studies highlight the importance of well-being in the helping professions, because the quality of the intervention seems to be closely linked to the well-being of professionals. United Nations Agenda 2030 emphasises the importance and the connection between the well-being and sustainable development. The third SDG, which concerns health and well-being, and the fourth SDG, which focuses on quality education and lifelong learning, can be considered the most salient priorities. According to WHO (1948), health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and is not merely the absence of disease. When this concept is applied to professional contexts, particularly to helping professions, it implies that working conditions directly affect health. The literature describes burnout as a complex syndrome, with manifestations of emotional exhaustion, that is the feeling of being drained, depersonalisation, that is emotional detachment and negativity towards users, reduced personal fulfilment and a sense of perceived ineffectiveness. Burnout is often conceived as an individual phenomenon, but it should be considered in a systemic way (Maslach e Leiter, 2023). In this sense, preventive care becomes crucial. According to Tronto (1993), care involves considering individuals as interdependent. Tronto's idea of “democracy of care” is significant in highlighting care as a practice (2013) and the centrality of individual needs. In this framework of interdependence, it is useful to refer to the well-being of both users and educators, considering the virtuous circle that can be generated through solidarity and mutual recognition of the other. Promoting the well-being of educators is crucial: there is a wealth of scientific literature on burnout among teachers, while scientific literature on educators is considerably more limited. This study aims to investigate and promote the well-being of educators from a preventive perspective with regard to burnout and to show how good practices can promote it. In particular, it starts from a pedagogical perspective through which narration is considered a constructor of reality and re-signification (Demetrio, 2003; Vygotskij, 1978). The paper develops an initial top-down complemented by a bottom-up approach, assuming the participatory action research perspective. The study aims to show whether autobiographical practices and self-help groups can be useful tools to promote the well-being of educators. Autobiographical workshops would be meaningful in stimulating reinterpretation on a professional and identity level; reformulating helps to retell oneself, and this transformation helps to attribute a different view of past events, while self-help workshops can increase the sense of belonging by preventing isolation. In groups, the dynamics of solidarity and listening promote empowerment and a virtuous circle of awareness. These are horizontal groups where the facilitator is on the same level as the other participants in terms of dialogue (Steinberg, 2002). Both approaches have a transformative matrix oriented towards subjective and intersubjective well-being and can be outlined as adult learning practices to support empowerment and critical reflection in a vision of active citizenship.