As part of the Erasmus+ KA220 HED project PrEcIOUS – Promoting pluralistic education in European universities to combat invisible discrimination related to LGBTQ+, students from Italy, Greece, Lithuania, and Poland took part in a blended training experience combining online learning and short-term mobility. After engaging in a virtual training designed to foster self-awareness and critical reflection on invisible homophobia, some participants got the opportunity to join the short-term training mobility in May 2025 at the University of Siena.
In the following piece, Piyarat Punpoosa, a Master’s student in European Studies at UniSi, shares how this two-phase learning journey reshaped her understanding of bias and community, and strengthened her commitment to inclusion within the academic world.
“Before the start of summer school, I participated in a training program for being an unbiased citizen by PrEcIOUS. We, students from Italy, Greece, Lithuania, and Poland, learned about and discussed ongoing problems, especially in the university context. From the course, I realized that even though I feel like homophobia issues have been addressed for a long time, they are still ongoing and sometimes difficult to detect. It was shocking to see that sometimes a normal behavior that we get used to and live without emotion could be considered a bias, a prejudice, or even worse, discrimination. Sometimes, we let ourselves become victims of it without knowing, or we are even part of these disappointing outcomes stemming from binary views and long-standing practices in our society. Thanks to the training course, we are enlightened and began to build a community of students and university staff ready to confront these issues, aiming to make our university a truly safe space.
Two months later, what we learned in our classroom became more solid and practical at the summer school. It was hosted in a welcoming academic environment with friendly staff, and students from different countries were brought together under one roof. It did not take long for all of us to become familiar with each other since we all have the same goals and expectations from attending summer school. In our daily lives, we speak different languages and come from different cultural backgrounds, but we share similar experiences in our universities when it comes to issues like invisible homophobia or discrimination faced by LGBTQIA+ individuals. Moreover, this summer school created many first-time experiences for me and others. It was the first time we were asked to express our preferred pronouns and how we would like to be addressed. It was the first time we were told that it was ok not to talk about things we did not feel comfortable discussing. It was the first time that we were allowed to leave the floor when we needed space to rest, and nobody would judge. Therefore, I can say that we truly initiated a very safe space, starting from a small lecture room.
Additionally, the program was very well-designed, and our learning path developed day by day. Throughout the week, we had lectures led by experts and NGO representatives in various fields such as law, human rights, and gender studies. Beyond the academic sessions, we discovered various new learning methods that were fun and interactive. Every day, we had group activities that were not only educational but fostered meaningful exchanges between students and staff. In addition, we were taken to different places in the university and the hidden gems in Siena, which for me was such an exclusive and rare opportunity. Even an ice-breaking activity implicitly gave us a big lesson to learn as well. Also, the program always created space for reflection and encouraged us to examine our own attitudes, unconscious biases, and social conditioning regarding gender and sexuality, and to think about how we can be better allies.
Overall, the experience from this 5-day summer school by PrEcIOUS was much more than academic training. Each of us agreed that it was a great chance to deepen our understanding of homophobia issues, especially in higher education, thanks to the organizers, guest speakers, and fellow students who created such a supportive learning environment. We also developed our readiness to be people who initiate ways to combat invisible homophobia, starting within our educational environment. I hope that everything that we shared during summer school will eventually come true and be put into practice in our own universities.”