Students in the 1st cycle of basic education are exempt from returning their textbooks at the end of this school year, but must deliver them “in the following school year”.
The decision is contained in the diploma that establishes the rules for implementing the State Budget for this year (decree-law no. 17/2024), which includes two articles related to the free textbook program, which has been in force since 2016.
For reasons of financial sustainability, the program aimed at public school students involves the reuse of manuals, a practice that was suspended during the Covid-19 pandemic so that students could recover or acquire learning from previous years.
At the end of the last school year, the Ministry of Education decided to resume the plan to return textbooks, but the measure was criticized by families of younger children and school directors who claimed to have been informed too late.
This year, all «students in the 1st cycle of basic education are exempt from returning their textbooks at the end of the school year», states the diploma published on January 29th.
However, families must return them “in the following school year”, according to the diploma which adds that in September 2024 all students in the 1st cycle of public schools will have “new school textbooks”.
In September 2023, Minister João Costa announced the end of the return of manuals for 1st cycle students, justifying the measure with the low rate of reuse.
The free textbook program began in the 2016/2017 school year for younger students, gradually being extended to more students.
Since 2019, around one million children and young people from grades 1 to 12 have received free school textbooks.
The books are made available through vouchers issued on a digital platform, with guardians being responsible “for any loss or deterioration of the manual on physical support received”, states the diploma published at the end of last month.
The order states, however, that families will not be penalized if it is "wear arising from normal, prudent and appropriate use, given the type of use and discipline for which they were designed, the condition in which they were received by the student, the age of the student and other subjective and objective circumstances that make this same responsibility unenforceable».
The financial sustainability of this project is also based on the reuse of manuals, auditors from the Court of Auditors (TdC) have warned in the various assessments they have carried out on the project.
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