Português Mais Perto – Close to 31 countries on five continents

Português Mais Perto – Platform, a digital distance learning tool, was extended to 31 countries in the academic year 2017/2018, spread over five continents, with a frequency of 575 Portuguese or Portuguese students, according to data from the Camões Institute.

The number of countries of Português Mais Perto, a platform developed by Camões – Instituto de Cooperação e da Língua and Porto Editora presented two years ago, increased from 26 in the academic year 2017/18, also in all continents, to more than three tens in 2018/19.

The president of the Camões Institute, Luís Faro Ramos, emphasized that “the project will be implemented in three more countries – South Africa, Australia and Venezuela – within a diversification strategy that is being put into practice, allowing access of students to quality content in areas not covered by the “Portuguese teaching network“.

In the case of Australia, Luís Faro Ramos clarified that “in a relatively low number of Portuguese students, the effort is directed to stimulate this learning free of charge in establishments selected by the coordination of Portuguese teaching.”

Free-of-charge Portuguese tuition is also applicable in South Africa and Venezuela this school year, unlike Canada (Ottawa, Montreal and Toronto) and the United States (California, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York and New Jersey) where “the average standard of living generally allows users to use the paying platform”.

The enlargement of the Camões Institute network on the Portuguese Nearest Platform follows the pilot project of using the multimedia tool in Canada and the United States, with 11 schools, 33 teachers and 486 students in the 2017/18 school year with ” to familiarize potential users with the platform. ”

“One of the main results of this pilot project is the intention already expressed by the Consular Consultative Council of the Portuguese Consulate General in São Francisco to extend the use of the platform to all community schools and to the official teaching where Portuguese is learned“, explained Luís Faro Ramos.

In the academic year 2017/18, with a universe of 33 teachers, 575 students enrolled in the Portuguese Nearest Tool, “of particular relevance in countries where there is no official network of the Camões Institute, since it appears as a complementary resource of use in the classroom, with local tutors/teachers “.

In Africa, enrolled students were based in Mozambique, Reunion (French overseas departments in the Indian Ocean) and South Africa.

Germany, Belgium, Denmark, Spain, France, Italy, France, Luxembourg, Norway, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia and Switzerland, plus Portugal, were European countries registered with the virtual platform, 1st Cycle (1st to 4th year), 2nd Cycle (5th and 6th), 3rd Cycle (7th to 9th) and Secondary (10th to 12).

The multimedia resource had in 2017/18 enrolled in Brunei, China, UAE, Macau, Turkey and Vietnam.

In the American continent, besides students from Canada and the United States, there were also registrations in Uruguay and Bermuda.

In this school year 2018/19, “there are currently 535 individual and institutional registrations”, with “the majority of users attending Portuguese language of inheritance (523)“, intended for students who have always attended school abroad, with a residual register belonging to the Portuguese mother tongue, for those who were in schools in Portugal and have on the horizon to return to the Portuguese education system.

Venezuela (150 students), South Africa and the United States (125) are the countries that, to date, have more students enrolled in the virtual platform.

Australia (Canberra, Melbourne and New South Wales) and Canada (Edmonton and Montreal) each have 50 enrollees.

Of the total enrollments in this school year – 535 -, 35 refer to individual registrations from September to December last year, of which 30 without a tutor.