My validation experience by Laura Bellucci from Italy

[laurabe...@gmail.com]

Since I learnt to read and write, I started dreaming about becoming a writer and a journalist. Writing to me was a way to explore, question and understand reality. As I grew up, I fell in love with languages: I realized that words reflects the way in which we look the world. Not only, their greatest power is to shape our vision and to spread new values and concepts. That’s why I studied linguistics and IT at University of Rome Tor Vergata, graduating in October 2019. In 2017 my first book was published and now I write for several newspapers.

Since 2015 I volunteer at Associazione Primavera, and from 2017 to 2018 I spent there one year as a volunteer of the National Civil Service. This association supports people with disability. As I started this experience, my main aim was to fight discrimination against them. This experience taught me to go beyond how the collective imagination thinks to disabled, often in terms of limited and painful lives. Abandoned any prejudice, I started to consider each person with disability for what he or she is: a human being with his or her own personality, preferences, qualities and flaws. During this period, I learnt how to relate with various people and to understand their specific needs. Each one communicates and interact differently. That's why I understood the importance to use several unconventional languages, such as theatre and sport, to express themselves.

Thanks to EVA VOL Project, I’m more conscious about the abilities I acquired in non-formal learning contexts. As a tester, I had the opportunity to reflect on the numerous situations in which I can apply the skills I developed while volunteering. Moreover, I found the questionnaire was extremely helpful to understand how my contribute is perceived by other people and to realize which are my strong points according to them.

VIDEOS:

1) I introduce myself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6cVN-pHSwc&t=14s

2) Associazione Primavera: what is it and what is does? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaPyAAqyf60

3) What they say about me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j26hpaE-Gog