About Portugal School

We are a secondary school situated in the centre of Portugal, 120km far from Lisbon. Due to the recent government policies we grouped with other schools and formed the " Agrupamento de Escolas Cidade do Entroncamento" made up of six schools. We are used to doing the horizontal and vertical articulation of studies (among years of studies, all the students who attend year 8 for example work together in projects, and among cycles of studies, students who attend the preparatory school and students who attend the secondary school get involved in the same projects). The school which applies for this project has 1200 students, aged 12-18 and 70 teachers. We are situated in an urban area with a population working mainly in the services sector. Most of these workers travel daily to Lisbon to work there. Due to the deep economic crisis the country is going through, there is a high percentage of unemployed people with strong effects on school life (students are having problems of malnutrition, students don't have money to buy their books and other school stuff, there is a lack of motivation to keep on studying, students tend to present disruptive behaviour). Just a few students present high expectations concerning their future life, having intentions to continue their studies in the university or other institutions of Higher Education. We also have vocational courses aiming to qualify students for the job market, integrating them and thus trying to decrease the risk of exclusion. There has been an increase in the number of students from different countries because of migration( students from our former colonies like Angola, Mozambique that lived in Lisbon moved to our town since we have less expensive living conditions), and immigration (from China, Eastern European countries, Brazil). We are a reference school for the blind students and have a group of teachers who work with students with other specific needs like autism. The school has a group of qualified and stable teachers. There are some extracurricular activities like clubs that aim at involving the students in a variety of activities trying to turn the curriculum meaningful to students and building bridges to real life. Our motivation to participate in the project is that we have experienced cases of bullying and discrimination. We have a community of Roma with difficulties to join the School or students with disabilities that are sometimes discriminated. It is necessary to help students understand these issues and create conditions for non-discrimination. Our school has a group of teachers of different subjects like Geography, History, Art, English, French, Portuguese, Citizenship and ICT that develop activities focusing on bullying and discrimination in the school. They will be involved in the project, covering project areas such as dissemination, preparation of students, accompanying students, evaluation etc. The coordinator is Maria de Lurdes Ferreira Gameiro.