From 3 to 6 July 2025, LINEup joined the Social Hackathon Umbria (SHU2025) – an international gathering dedicated to digital creativity, civic engagement, and social innovation. Held in the heart of Umbria, the four-day event brought together over 400 participants from around the world to co-design solutions around three key themes: BIO-diversity, NEURO-diversity, and SOCIO-diversity.

Within this dynamic setting, LINEup hosted a participatory workshop focused on one of the most urgent yet often overlooked aspects of socio- and neuro-diversity: educational inequality.

The workshop unfolded in three interwoven moments:

1) Rediscovering a visionary school
A powerful monologue by David Verazzani, director of the FringeMI Festival, brought to life the inspiring story of Casa del Sole in Milan. Founded in the early 20th century as a school for children from working-class families, Casa del Sole was rooted in the values of health, creativity, hands-on learning, and inclusion. Its innovative pedagogy combined outdoor education, manual workshops, and intercultural dialogue long before such approaches became common. Through a vivid and passionate narration, Verazzani invited participants to rediscover this visionary model of schooling –  one that placed the well-being and potential of every child at the heart of the educational experience.

2) Opening up the data: the LINEup project
Veronica Mobilio, Head for Research at Fondazione per la Scuola, introduced the LINEup project through a short and engaging presentation tailored to a mixed audience of students, teachers, and parents.

Using clear language and vivid examples, she explained what educational inequalities are, how they emerge and deepen over time, and how longitudinal data can help us understand and challenge them. Participants responded with genuine interest: the Q&A turned into a vibrant dialogue about inclusion, opportunity, and the concrete role each actor –  families, educators, learners – can play in promoting equitable learning environments. Many shared their own experiences, and what started as an introduction to research gradually became a shared reflection on how schools can support every child’s growth – academically, emotionally, and socially.

3) Animating ideas for change: the stop motion lab

This growing interest set the stage for the creative stop motion lab that followed – a participatory space where each group could express their vision of education and fairness through visual storytelling and animation. This shared curiosity and energy carried into the third part of the workshop: a stop motion animation lab led by the artists of Primanima, an international animation festival based in Hungary and partner of SHU2025. Over the course of 90 minutes, participants worked in groups to co-create short animated videos inspired by real educational experiences – from moments of inclusion to challenges of inequality –transforming ideas for change into engaging, inclusive visual narratives.

The workshop combined creativity, community, and critical awareness, allowing participants to reflect on what education means to them and to reimagine schools as spaces where every learner can grow and belong.

The videos created were as diverse as the people behind them. One depicted school as a garden, where students are like different plants: they all have the potential to grow, but only if they receive the specific care, time, and attention they need. Another imagined the classroom as a kaleidoscope or a world full of different colours, where individual differences come together to form something greater.

These visual metaphors reflect the power of visual storytelling to surface emotions, insights, and visions that words alone often cannot convey. They also highlight the importance of engaging communities directly – not just as recipients of research, but as co-creators of knowledge and change.

The LINEup team will continue to share these outputs through its communication channels and draw inspiration from this creative experience to shape future participatory activities – where data meets imagination, and research becomes a tool for shared transformation.

Want to know more? Watch the interview with Veronica Mobilio.