La supervisione dell'educatore professionale. Per un'identita nel lavoro

[Autom. eng. transl.] To what, who needs supervision? By whom is it conducted? When does it come into play? How can it be connoted? The assumption of these and other similar questions has characterized the course of investigation and exploration on the dimension of the supervision of the professional educator, whose results are presented in the form of analysis and elaboration in this volume. A path led by Iref in collaboration with the Esa of Milan, on the initiative of the Family and Social Policies sector of the Lombardy Region. Faced with a strong need and investment in it within the professional teams, the plurality and extreme differentiation of the forms and methods of supervision is indeed reflected. This is not always an expression of wealth and conscious variety of approaches, but in many cases it is a sign of fragmentation, confusion and "consumerist" use of supervision on the "market" of the many existing offers. The text suggests a reconnaissance itinerary within this variegated world, with the intention of acquiring some gain in terms of definition, clarity of the connotative aspects, identification of reference coordinates to move towards discerning. The course has enhanced experiences, locations and contexts in place, with a view to action-research, contacting the willingness to be involved by educators and services and trying to identify aspects and conditions through which supervision takes the form of an essential dimension for the increasingly qualified conduct of educational activity. The result was an idea of supervision as a work tool that supports the personal and professional growth of educational operators and guarantees a sort of "maintenance" work, that is able to sustain continuous innovative adaptations of one's professionalism. The supervision becomes, in this perspective, a peculiar support to the process of constant attribution of meaning which the educator is confronted not only with respect to the problematic situations he encounters, but also in terms of coping with the critical events represented by his path of individuation / professional qualification and situations of socialization working related to the specific organizational contexts in which it operates. With reference to the wide phenomenology of the investigated experiences, indications and regulatory axes are suggested, as well as hints and critical nodes detected, certainly not exhaustive or definitive, but useful and significant for a targeted orientation and setting of an increasingly adequate offer of supervision to professional educators.