Arturo Prattico has founded a free cooking school in Italy's Calabria region as a way to divert youth from employment with the mafia. Prattico invested his own funds to start Uno Chef per Elena e Pietro, which is named for his daughter and grandson. The region has a high youth unemployment rate, 53%, and Prattico's free cooking school offers another alternative to local youth besides the mafia or leaving the region. We need to take back hold of our territory with culture, says Prattico. Writer Agostino Petroni ends his story of this unique school saying, "The Uno Chef per Elena e Pietro school might be a tool for many to remain in this wondrous area and create a future for themselves. As student Maria Antonietta Galletta said as she described to me the beauty of the sea and the Aspromonte mountains outside her window, 'Why should I leave all this?'

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