Luca, 21.

Luca’s backpack is heavier now than it ever was in school. But instead of books and ambition, it carries survival. A half-charged phone, a wrinkled CV, and a sweater he wears like armor.

He graduated three months ago. Top 10% of his class. Digital media degree and minor in sociology. A kid with big ideas and ambition. He wanted to build worlds. But now he’s sitting at the edge of one: a metro platform at midnight, diploma still in his bag, nowhere to go.

He sent out dozens of applications. Polished his LinkedIn and recorded hopeful video pitches. Rejections trickled in, slow at first, then faster. Then came the silence. The couch-hopping. The forced smile. The pretending.

And then came the bottom, started with a night spent on a bench, a skipped meal, the kind of exhaustion that makes even hope feel expensive.

This wasn’t supposed to be his story, but here he is. Not broken, just buried under a system that only notices when you’ve already disappeared.

ALKOTÓ x Stichting Goud aren’t telling sob stories. We’re telling the truth.

Luca did everything right. But in a world where support is transactional, and talent isn’t enough, doing everything right means nothing.

When we don’t care, young potential turns into lost presence.

Graduation becomes the final applause, not the beginning.