Before a packed auditorium that applauded her again and again, Verónica Filotti took the oath along with her management team to assume command of the Polytechnic Institute.
The new authorities of the Higher Polytechnic Institute, who were democratically elected for the second time, assumed their mandate in the midst of fervor and joy for this renewal that comes with Verónica Filotti and her team to face the challenge of sustaining the excellence of this prestigious institution. and promote the transformations that the community demands.
Verónica Filotti was elected director of the middle school last April with 70 percent of the votes of the four groups: teachers, non-teachers, students and graduates of the Polytechnic. Yesterday, before a packed auditorium that applauded her again and again, the rector of the UNR, Franco Bartolacci, took the oath to Filotti that she assumed along with her management team made up of Diego Espinosa, vice director of Secondary Education – General Training; Armando Frávega, vice director of Secondary Education – Specific Training; Federico Tirapelli, vice director of Higher Education; Roque Intelángelo, vice director of Extension and Liaison; and César Altuzarra, vice director of Infrastructure.
This election process had been enabled by Rector Bartolacci and the University Assembly in 2019, a fact that established the full political integration of the middle school community into the institutional structure of the University. The first precedent of an authority elected by his own community was in November 2019 when Juan Farina was voted as director of the Polytechnic. Therefore, yesterday afternoon the first transition of authorities carried out under this participatory election system took place.
Overwhelmed by emotion, Filotti began her speech by recalling a phrase by the Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano. “I read the following sentence a long time ago: Scientists say that we are made of atoms, but a little bird told me that we are made of stories. I fully share what that little bird told Galeano. We are made of stories, during the 33 years that I was a mathematics teacher at Poli, I came to this place so many times, to the beginning of class events, I came to give medals and diplomas to the kids in fifth, sixth, and third grade polymodal, ninth EGB, I came to listen to talks. But who was going to tell me that this place was going to continue being part of my history? I don't know how to put together speeches, I speak like every day, and today I speak for the first time as director of the Poli,” she expressed with a broken voice.
Filotti remembered two other female directors of the Polytechnic, Liliana Lagreca and Patricia Zeoli, to highlight and thank other professors and trainers who were their teachers. She then recalled her choice that led her to the position: “I am proud to be the first director of this era so eager to be university citizens. The day the student count ended, I remember Franco's message that said 'tremendous election.' And those two words remained with me: tremendous choice. And to this day I can't believe it."
“I am leaving a place where I have been and am immensely happy: the mathematics department. I love teaching classes. This is a new challenge for me, something I never thought about a year ago,” she said to promise to work for the Polytechnic, which is a university, technical, secular, free school of excellence. “At this time I commit to defending the university, the free public university. I'm going for that and I want to work for the Poli that we deserve, the Poli that we want, a better Polytechnic. “I invite you to dream with me,” she closed with eyes full of tears.
Rector Bartolacci gave the Trejo Key to Filotti and dedicated affectionate words to him: “I share the enormous happiness that it brings me for many reasons to be celebrating this institutional event today that is very important, not only for the Polytechnic community, it is also For the whole Universidad Nacional de Rosario, the same dimension and magnitude as for this house, and I would also dare to say that for education and citizenship, because of what the Poli implies, because of the relevance that the history of our institution and the city has and the truth is that it does not There is, at least for me, nothing more mobilizing than listening to a hymn and singing it in a school. In this complex time we are living in, it means a reserve of being able to accumulate hope to find solutions to structural problems, which time passes and we cannot solve. to that labyrinth from which it seems so difficult to get out.”
Bartolacci recalled when four years ago the statute reform was carried out that recognized the active and genuine participation of the communities of pre-university schools in the governing bodies. “It is an unprecedented fact, which does not happen nor is it frequent throughout the country,” he highlighted to highlight that in addition to the direct election of the authorities, the pedagogical proposal for middle schools has been extended. "Four years later we also have the new school of Social and Humanistic Sciences underway, we have a secondary education proposal already being developed in the city of El Trébol, in Puerto San Martín and in General Lagos."
“We give you the replica of the trejo key so that you assume that historical mandate that we have as a university to be faithful custodians of the values of the reform, of excellence in the history of this institution and of the need to work every day to project it as the country needs and expects from us. We wish the best of luck to Vero, who is also a great and beloved professor, very recognized, but above all good people, which for me is an unavoidable condition to be able to carry out good institutional management," he closed accompanied by a standing ovation.
Journalist: Micaela Pereyra / Photographer: Camila Casero