THE 4TH YEAR COMPUTER SCIENCE CLASS OF THE LAGRANGE INSTITUTE IN MILAN AWARDED AT ARCHIVISSIMA 2025 WITH A STORY INSPIRED BY THE BRACCO HISTORICAL ARCHIVE

Archivissima is the Festival of Archives created and supported by Promemoria Group and organised by the cultural association Archivissima. The main aim of the initiative is to promote the wealth of heritage preserved in historical archives.

Held from 5 to 8 June 2025, the eighth edition of Archivissima, with the theme “DALLA PARTE DEL FUTURO” (On the side of the future), involved almost 500 organisations from all 20 regions, and many Italian schools were also invited to participate in this major event. A challenge was set for students of all ages, from primary to secondary school: each class was assigned an archive and asked to imagine what our future could be like if even a small element of the past were to change. Class 4B IT of the Iss Lagrange Institute in Milan participated in the contest “La scuola racconta un archivio” (The school tells the story of an archive) with the Bracco Historical Archive. The story, “IL VALORE DI X’ (THE VALUE OF X), imagines a future without the discovery of X-rays.

“The world of Sofia Röntgen, descendant of Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen, is exactly like ours. There is only one difference: the discovery of X-rays never happened. This robbed the girl’s reality of the contribution of many women and men, as evidenced by an ancient family treasure. One evening in November, on what is, in our world, the centenary of the discovery, the student has an experience that is somewhere between dream and reality. This is how she learns about this precious discovery. Bracco Industria Chimica played a leading role in this field, and its history is preserved in its Historical Archive…”

The students of 4°B Informatica were among the winners of the contest. Their story, selected along with nine others by the jury, was published and included in the anthology “Memorie dai mondi possibili” (Memories from Possible Worlds).

Read the The value of X.

Congratulations also to the class teachers, Prof. Alessio Fadda and Prof.ssa Alessandra Valpiani.