The lesson of Don Lorenzo Milani and the school of Barbiana is visionary in light of the bill approved by the Chamber of Deputies (2372/22) regarding the enhancement of non-cognitive skills in schooling. Not always appreciated in his way of doing, Don Lorenzo Milani, in 1956, launched a revolutionary experiment of a school attended by children with strong cultural, social and economic disadvantages. It is a non-conformist school that uses the "subversive" power of words to change the order of educational priorities and interests of the same children who attend it. The normative need to integrate disciplinary knowledge with the acquisition of non-cognitive skills useful to face and prevent situations of functional illiteracy, educational poverty and school drop-out invites a careful reflection on the pedagogical commitment and responsibility of the school as an educating community in the difficult balance between cognitive and non-cognitive skills in the processes of inclusion, equity and social justice.