November 17, 2021
PARTNERSHIP BETWEEN REGGIO CHILDREN AND GLOBAL EMBASSY TO DEVELOP THE FIRST PRE-SCHOOL IN VIETNAM BASED ON THE REGGIO CHILDREN APPROACH
“The future is a bright day”. The words of a 5-year-old pupil of a pre-school in Reggio Emilia, quoted by the Reggio Children Foundation Chairwoman Claudia Giudici, have perfectly framed the celebrations for the agreement between Reggio Children and Global Embassy, for the development of the first network of pre-schools in Vietnam based on the Reggio Emilia approach.
Global Embassy is part of the Embassy Education Foundation, led by artist singer and philanthropist Bui Vu Thanh, expressly devoted to develop this network of pre-schools in Vietnam named “Little Em’s”.
During the ceremony, at the presence of local authorities, representatives of Vietnamese and international education institutions in Saigon, the Consul General of Italy Dante Brandi delivered a message also on behalf of the Italian Ambassador to Vietnam Antonio Alessandro on how this partnership is bringing the bilateral relations on education between Italy and Vietnam to another level. Global Embassy will be the only educational institution in Vietnam recognized by Reggio Children and authorized to promote the Reggio Emilia approach in the country.
The “Reggio Emilia Approach” is a philosophy that was developed in the Reggio Emilia municipal nursery and elementary schools by prof. Loris Malaguzzi in the post-war period, based on the idea that a child is the subject and holder of rights, who learns and grows in relationship with others, producing knowledge and communicating it to the external world through numerous languages, both verbal and non-verbal.
With this partnership, Reggio Children further expand its international network, which encompasses now pre-schools in San Francisco, Beijing, Hong Kong. Meaningfully, the Vietnamese project “Little Em’s” is the first pre-school not providing bicurricular programs with Italy, in demonstration of the universal value of the pedagogic approach of Reggio Emilia and the maturity of its internationalisation process.
On 12 September, the Italian Foreign Ministry signed a Declaration of Intent with the Fondazione Reggio Children – Centro Loris Malaguzzi, with the aim of promoting solidarity projects through research in the area of education.
