en 
The study ‘National and international students in access to higher education’ released by the Belmiro de Azevedo Foundation, shows that there are more foreign students choosing Portugal to study, but many institutions continue to ignore the recommendations made by the Government seven years ago.
In 2014, the report “A Strategy for the Internationalization of Portuguese Higher Education” presented several warnings that, according to the study, “have not been applied”. One of them was the importance of having educational training given in English.
In the 2019/20 academic year, of the nearly 50,000 international students, nearly three out of four (72.9 percent) spoke Portuguese: 40.63 percent were from Brazil and 32.29 percent from the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP).
Of the remaining approximately 13,000 students, young people from Spain, France, Italy and Germany stood out, “where there are important communities of Portuguese descendants”.
For Edulog researchers, this reality means that “one of the weaknesses of the internationalisation process remains as a result of the poor offer of study cycles in the English language”, an issue that had been addressed in the report's recommendations, “apparently without great results” .
The researchers also highlight the fact that the International Student Statute excludes international students from the possibility of applying for scholarships. Only CPLP students are eligible, “which places our institutions at a clear inferiority in a competitive and globalised higher education market”.
Bureaucracy
Another problem detected is the bureaucracy involved in obtaining visas for students from outside the Community.
The study warns that the Via Verde, which was also proposed in the 2014 report, was never implemented, and points to the absence of national coordination between the bodies involved in the path of international students.
Regarding the challenges highlighted, the spokesperson for the study, Alberto Amaral, warned of the gradual decrease in the birth rate in Portugal and the need to have these foreign students in Portugal.
In the near future, there will be a reduction in Portuguese young people entering higher education and therefore the internationalisation of Portuguese higher education will be “one of the main strategies to support the sustainability of institutions, and that is why it is imperative to start adopting measures to mitigate the difficulties in the international development of our education system”.
Edulog recommends greater investment in funding academic research to improve the country's international visibility at a scientific level.
In addition, it defends the promotion of a training offer in English, to be able to attract students from other countries in addition to those from Portuguese-speaking countries.
The creation of a “student visa”, based on a simplified bureaucracy, as is already the case, for example, in Germany, Poland and Sweden, is another of the recommendations of the study released.
English
Nederlands
Deutsch
Français
Español
Italiano
Svenska
Pусский
Română
中文
Türkçe
हिन्दी
Português
Українська
اردو
Polski
عربي
Suomi
עִברִית
Afrikaans
Português (Brasil)
Portugal continues focused on its past instead of a European future. These oversea students are only mostly from Africa and Brazil who will use Portugal as a stepping stone to gain access to the EU. The fundamental question remains: what benefits do they bring?
By K from Algarve on 29 Nov 2021, 13:15
This is very good. This is a way to help foreigners learn valuable ways to make the world more prosperous and friendly and bridge cultural divides. This is exactly what we need, and we know from the Bible that this is what God wants for everyone in the world to live at peace and learning from one another.
By Alan Lewis Silva from USA on 30 Nov 2021, 00:29
Legal students from Brazil and Africa is exactly what the European Union needs, not people you do not know hopping from a boat and risking their lives and the lives of others. We have the same problem in America where legal channels are closed off and the illegal channels are left open to gangs and misfits.
By Alan Lewis Silva from USA on 30 Nov 2021, 00:34
Brits use Pt as a stepping stone to remain in the EU. Who benefits? Us locals, K?(Just being intellectually honest). These students did not affect rents/house prices. They might stay and work here-decent ppl are always welcome,-or they might go back to their countries after they finish their studies. Even if they opt for the 2nd path, they surely do less harm than Europeans other than Portuguese living here. It wasn´t these students and non European ppl coming here that fundamentally changed the country´s socio-economic fabric of locals for worse.
By guida from Lisbon on 30 Nov 2021, 05:55
Guida, you raise interesting points. My question is how do you mean that foreigners have made life worse in Portugal?
By k from Algarve on 30 Nov 2021, 14:11
(To reply to your question,K.) Refering to Lisbon (ppl w/pets can´t afford to make the simplest holiday arrangements, so no holidays for years, more than a decade. I can´t speak for Algarve).
Before the Tourism El dourado, whenever you went downtown there were tourists(for sure) mixed with the local population. Then I remember 2017(for eg), it looked(downtown) so overcrowded that to do a simple errand in town the whole area was packed (like when crowds come to watch a foot match”packed”, you´d feel trapped, movement wise). The day I was in town and black wheelchair guy was almost thrown to the floor by Chinese tourists while I screamed, cop watched, all the brits watching this in the tables outside did nothing…I was screaming in english, you know? I felt so alone, me and wheelchair guy alone in the madness.
Then the way brits have talked to me. 1 guy, in metro on way to town, asked me if I could tell him where foreign currency exchange store was. So I offered to take him there myself(had doubts about location, so didn´t want to give bad instructions by lapse).He starts saying my English is so good, surely I work in the hospitality dptmt?Inside I fumed. I said “I have never made a cent from tourist/hospitality sector/helping foreigners with directions of things-including taking them there myself”.He was quiet. I could feel he became afraid I wasn´t a helper(his face), told him”there are cameras in the metro”, and by the time we were facing the establishment he wanted I saw his relief, and he wanted to shake my hand and thanked me a lot.
The point is:it´s hurtful to have the brit remmitances thrown at 1´s face, when 1 clearly doesn´t benefit from any of it. Then when you try the normal relatedness standards (continues)
By guida from Lisbon on 01 Dec 2021, 06:35
(ppl helping ppl out just for its sake) the brits seem to feel a certain entitlement; and of course that breeds resentment. The students mentioned in the article don´t have that entitlement stance. They mingle better with locals bc they don´t have particular privileges compared to the locals.
1998, when I came from BXL, I remember seeing Portuguese elderly flocking to”Minipreço” to buy salt crackers. They were filling themselves with cheap carbs to fool hunger and deeper nutritional issues. Things were bad bf the tourism “EL dourado”, and then Pt started welcoming European retirees, and they didn´t contribute to the pensions fund locally(like locals do, and then spend it on salt crackers). They´re getting a lot of help when they´re way better off to begin with(compared to retirees here). It´s unfair, like 2 types of elderly ppl co-existing, and when I see these “welcome”campaigns, i´m either v.angry or just really depressed(I feel for the injustice). Then when you say “what good do they bring?”they have to pay all their taxes like locals do.
Then, there´s the”We´re Europeans” vs all the others who are not. The EU treated the UK like dirt after brexit and some brits still cling to the EU status…you want to be welcome everywhere but have pbs with ppl studying here who came from Africa and Brazil? We´ve had ties with them from colonization period(we went there to bother them ) and now these ppl coming to study here is a pb? I don´t feel so proud of being an European, K. It was that or my emotional sanity(things the EU has done and then it clings to the “European values” narrative? I have shame in my face, that´s the pb, I guess).I feel more at home with the “world” than some superciliary notion (it continues)
By guida from Lisbon on 01 Dec 2021, 06:37
that Europeans are special or better, when the record shows we´re clearly not.
There was a time when a wheelchair bound person would be protected from such abuse…but if the only pt ppl watching this were the waiters at the caffe and the policemen watching in amusement, who can we count on? No one, K.
By guida from Lisbon on 01 Dec 2021, 06:37