Since childhood Vittoria Altomonte , 16 years old, loved to scan stars and planets with the naked eye and today what has been a childhood pastime has become a passion, an object of study and in the future, we hope, the springboard for a profession. So, after the astronomy Olympics in Sri Lanka in 2018 and in Romania this year with the bronze medal, two national awards with internships in the Canary Islands and Sardinia, Vittoria has landed at “The school’s Fuoriclasse”. A project dedicated to the enhancement of excellent students, born from the agreement between the Foundation for Financial Education and Savings and the MIUR, with the support of the Turin Savings Museum, the Italian Banking Association and Confindustria.
How did you become an award-winning student?
I have to thank my teacher from the Euclid Higher Institute of Bova Marina (Reggio Calabria), Angela Misiano, who gave me the basics of the preparation and encouraged me to attend the Pythagoras Planetarium in Reggio, one of the most beautiful in Europe and totally digital. The school helped me a lot because they gave me the right advice and made me touch on topics that anticipated the educational program. My parents were also decisive, to the point that they even accompanied me every day to the Planetarium to improve my preparation for competitions.
How did this passion start?
A little by chance and then I cultivated it by reading the books of Stephen Hawking and Margherita Hack. Astronomy is a transversal matter that passes through literature (we find it in Dante and Leopardi), mathematics, physics, chemistry and art (just think, for example, of the comet of the Adoration of the Magi by Giotto).
