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The Department for Culture, Sport and Leisure Time – Library Network Offices is participating in the project on ‘Intercultural Mediations in the Rome Metropolitan Area: systems and experiments’ funded by the Ministry of the Interior through the European Fund for the Integration of Third Country Nationals (Action 5 Intercultural Mediation – Mediation and promotion of intercultural education).

The project leader is the C.R.E.A. Association (Centro Ricerche e Attività, with Headquarters in Palestrina) and the partners are the local health authority RMH and the Municipality of Ardea. There are also member partners: Rome IX Borough, Ardea Comprehensive Schools Ardea (Ardea II, Ardea III, Via della Tecnica, Via Laurentina 710, Indro Montanelli). Upon invitation by the Department for Culture, these also include the Municipalities and libraries of Anzio, Fiumicino, Lanuvio and Santa Marinella; the first 3 are already included in the network of ‘Libraries of the World’ promoted by the Provincial Library System.

Intercultural Mediators will be present in the libraries of Anzio, Fiumicino, Lanuvio and Santa Marinella with scheduled days and times, in order to provide a quick reference point for local services and in particular to provide orientation for consulting the ‘multicultural shelf’ and the library services, and to support the organization and utilization of proposals aimed at the sharing of the cultures and traditions of the various peoples.

The project is especially aimed at immigrants coming from countries like Albania, Bangladesh, Ecuador, the Philippines, India, Morocco, Moldavia, Peru and Tunisia. The purpose of the project is to offer intercultural mediation as a key tool to produce a local orientation model designed to encourage the migrants to become part of the local area, with the correct use of the services and the reduction of inequality, in order to implement the exercise of citizenship rights. The aim is to facilitate direct access by migrants through the creation of service networks and the identification of contact points for this purpose, promoting the opening and interaction between local services: schools, cultural, social and health care and municipal services.

Mediation is defined as a process for support to integration between the host society and foreign residents, facilitated by professionals but also activated with processes of internal change in the existing institutions and existing social organizations.

The areas of activity are: a) Intercultural mediation within the municipal, health care, scholastic and library services; b) Professional accompaniment and updating for the operators of the services; c) Activation of dialogue agents for the promotion of information about the services and the culture of healthcare within foreign communities; d) Communication and dissemination.

Among the specific goals: identifying welcoming processes to enhance intercultural dialogue and the promotion of active citizenship; sustaining school personnel (teachers and other personnel) in acquiring intercultural skills in teaching and in relations with foreign pupils and their families; providing support to the operators in the social and health care services for providing their prevention and care service for migrant mothers; to promote the active role of migrants as agents of dialogue and providers of mediation services.