It is time to celebrate three decades of offering higher education courses in Portimão to students from the Algarve and across the country, but also «a time of renewal», in which we look to the future. The 30th anniversary of the University of Algarve's Portimão Campus will be officially celebrated today, Saturday, December 3rd, at TEMPO – Teatro Municipal de Portimão, from 10:00 am, with a Gala where there will be no shortage of testimonials from those who have been there and became part of this "authentic family".
This house, which has always been managed by the Escola Superior de Gestão, Hotelaria e Turismo (ESGHT), has trained, over the years, “more than 2500 students” from all over the Algarve and other regions of the country, he told the Sul Informação Alexandra Gonçalves.
«For 30 years, ESGHT has fulfilled the mission of providing decentralized education in the Algarve. This is the only UAlg organic unit operating simultaneously on two campuses – in Penha and here in Portimão. We thought that 30 years, being a round number, was something to celebrate, not least because we are in a moment of total renewal of what is done here», added the director of this UAlg school.
«We are celebrating the past, but with our eyes on the future», he reinforced.
For Alexandra Gonçalves, what has been done in Portimão is «almost a replica of the training offer that exists in Faro».
In this Campus, three main courses are offered: degrees in Tourism and Management, day and night, and a Master's in Management of Small and Medium Enterprises.
There was also a CTESP in Tourism Entertainment Management, but it was closed this school year, after two years in which there was difficulty in recruiting students.
«We need to underpin the offer of higher education in Barlavento, not least because we have a growing young population. We have many young people who do not pursue higher education and it is important to create new offers so that these young people have access to education in the main areas of the region, but also in the trends that the market has come to request, which involve new technologies and STEAM areas – Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics», believes Alexandra Gonçalves.
«Today we realize that the region needs differentiated offers. And they no longer pass, perhaps, only through the same organic unit, guaranteeing the same type of offer in Faro and Portimão, but maybe we can think about going further», he added.
This dream involves, to a large extent, the construction of a new Campus in Portimão, an idea that has gained new impetus recently, as Sul Informação advanced, first hand, in August.
Renewing UAlg's offer in Portimão will always have to go through “other infrastructures and other conditions. Hence this proposal on the new campus, for which, in good time, Mr. rector, the mayor and the Commission for the Coordination and Regional Development of the Algarve joined forces».
In August, Paulo Águas, dean of the Algarve university, admitted to our newspaper that there is a will, there is a ground and there is joint work between these three entities in the search for a financing solution for this project, which will always be «medium/long term» .
The top representatives of these three institutions will, moreover, be present at tomorrow's gala.
«Our dean will be there, the president of the Commission for Coordination and Regional Development of the Algarve and the mayor, who welcomes us and always welcomes us very well», revealed Alexandra Gonçalves.
The party will also feature “testimonials from former students, namely Bruno Santos, Catarina Fonseca and Paulo Almeida, who was even director of the Escola Superior de Peniche, for marine technologies. He took the Hotel Management course here, when it was still taught here in Portimão ».
«It is extremely important to bring these former students to witness the importance that this training had in their lives», believes the director of ESGHT.
The gala also includes “a moment of celebration of the founders of this space: Professor Ludgero Sequeira, who was at the origin of the creation of this Campus, Professor Figueiredo Santos, who was the first coordinator of the pole and Dr. Cristina Bentes, who is the oldest employee of this house, where she continues to work, and who has always been an essential element in supporting the coordination of all services and in the interaction with students ».
Music, by Grupo Fole, cake, congratulations and «everything else that is part of a birthday party» are also part of the programme.
The celebrations of the 30th anniversary of the UAlg Campus in Portimão already included, throughout 2022, a series of lectures organized in partnership with the Gambelas library, as well as «an exhaustive program of conversations, workshops and dynamics».
Today, a commemorative photographic exhibition will be inaugurated at TEMPO, which can be seen until the 11th of December.
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