Wedding bells may soon be ringing – or, as the Italian press puts it, there may soon be orange blossom – for the Education Minister Mariastella Gelmini. Asked about a wedding date during the recording of an episode of the Maurizio Costanzo Show to be aired on TV on Sunday, Gelmini replied, “Soon. Certainly I’ll be ready in 2010”.
Gelmini is not exactly popular among most students and state school teachers in Italy for the education reforms she has proposed have not gone down well with these sectors of the population.
In primary schools, where teachers used to work in teams, she has implemented a “one teacher per class” policy and cut the number of hours of schooling per week.
In universities the Minister wants to cut the number of degree subjects on offer and more recently she has become embroiled in controversy over her plans to limit the number of immigrants in a class to 30%.
So when on Sunday she first announces her marriage plans and then speaks passionately about a book of Italian fairy tales which she is compiling, the public could be forgiven for imagining that she is mellowing. The Minister is collecting fairy tales from every region of Italy so that they will not be forgotten and she also hopes that parents will regain the habit of reading the stories to their children before bed.
Of course everyone now wants to know who the lucky bridegroom will be for Gelmini – young, intelligent and tough - is regarded as a hot property by the Italian media.
