ProActCoP: Co-creating knowledge about/and action for change in inland regions.

Professional Activism (PA) is highly relevant to contemporary life in Europe and beyond, but still a new and under-researched field in Portugal. It refers to advocacy, awareness raising, and other forms of political mobilisation of professionals on behalf of the people in situations of vulnerability with whom they work in educational, social, and community intervention. It implies defending these people’s causes and rights through a social-justice approach and diverse action repertoire.
Recent and innovative empirical evidence on PA revealed that its relation with the inland geographical context requires further attention and research. Concretely, it suggests that professionals working in inland regions have fewer (diverse) opportunities for PA engagement. It also highlights the need to reinforce the know-how to do PA in these contexts. In addition, much of this work may occur covertly or not be visible enough, so it is crucial to explore, document and promote the visibility of PA in inland regions.
This project addresses these gaps in research and intervention by setting up a unique opportunity to advance knowledge about PA education and engagement in Portugal's inland regions, anchored in the co-creation of a Professional Activism Community of Practice (PA CoP). This PA CoP will encourage professionals to share, collectively organise and act around a common cause. Through this innovative approach, it proposes to achieve a deeper understanding of these understudied phenomena, accomplishing the following objectives: to map and characterise PA engagement and experiences of professionals/organisations working with PSV in inland regions; to deepen knowledge about the influence of the inland geographical context on these professionals (dis)engagement, accessing needs regarding PA education and participation and concrete ways of strengthening these two areas; and to monitor and critically analyse the PA CoP collective lived experience, exploring its educational and politicisation potential.
This project is organised into four complementary tasks, following a mixed methodological design and an action-research-inspired approach. Task 1, 'Outlining evidence and experiences of professional activism in inland regions', integrates a scoping review and a rapid assessment approach, including document analysis, short surveys and interviews. Task 2, 'Co-creating (knowledge on) a professional activism community of practice', implies reflective sessions and practical workshops with a strong artistic component and mobilises discussion groups and ethnographic observation. Task 3, 'Project follow-up and critical reflection', concerns an advisory group's critical monitoring throughout the project, which will produce recommendations. Task 4, 'Disseminate, boost visibility and build interactive archive', consists of actions aimed at sharing and discussing the project activities and results, namely through the PA CoP Website, including an interactive map of PA in inland regions and a PA resources archive.
It will make an innovative and timely contribution to advance knowledge about PA education and engagement in Portugal’s inland regions by creating an in-depth theoretical, empirical, and practical framework based on these regions that will inform educational, intervention, and research practices in this field.

Building Participatory Democracy – April Grassroots Associations of Porto

The Portuguese associative tradition, whose roots go back to the 19th century and which saw an important expansion in the First Republic (1910-1926) linked to the labour movement and socialist ideals, resisted the dictatorship's repressive control of associative action and, in some cases, even constituted a space for practices of freedom and free learning of the regime's ideological project. These dynamics of resistance were amplified to an unprecedented degree in the explosion of freedoms brought about by the April revolution. At a local level, research into these types of contexts still needs attention, particularly regarding the educational, social, political and cultural assumptions that remain in these institutions that are subsidiaries of April, both in their heritage and in their present activity, as well as in their sociability and symbolic heritage. Subsidiaries of the social emergencies of a decisive historical time, the associative movement is not just a circumstance. As a living social organism, the associative movement shapes sociability, produces, validates and archives knowledge and organises solidarity in contexts particularly affected by the retreat of the welfare state. Local associations take on characteristics that validate them as instances of informal and non-formal education, as well as being cultural and historical indices of 50 years of democracy. The aim of this project is to contribute to sociological, historical and educational knowledge about Porto's popular association movement in its relationship with the April Revolution and democratic consolidation and specifically about the developments and associative challenges faced by popular associations in Porto created during the PREC and in the first years after the approval of the Constitution of the Portuguese Republic. In order to fulfil this objective, the project is based on three case studies – Universidade Popular do Porto, Associação Nacional dos Deficientes Sinistrados no Trabalho e Associação de Moradores da Lomba - based on the social and educational intervention heritage developed in the training and internships of Social Educators formed at Porto School of Education. After almost five decades, these associations remain active and claim April´s Revolution democratic legacy, which justifies a detailed study of their history and associative practices. In line with Rodrigues (2015), one of the project's lines of innovation is to question the extent to which the roots of popular mobilisation are maintained in these associations, at what level, with what intensity and with what new dynamics. On the other hand, the project also aims to preserve a social and collective history from the north of the country that is still little studied and known, even though it is fundamental for understanding and evolving Portuguese democracy over the last 50 years. To respond to this objective, the project also uses oral history methodology aiming to collect oral testimonies and part of these associations archives making this data available to an academic and general public.

Know-how to speak out: Education for and in professional activism (2023.06314.CEECIND)

SINCRONY: interSectIonal iNClusion in delibeRation and participatiON with Youth

ClimActiC: Citizenship for Climate – Building Bridges between Citizenship and Science for Climate Adaptation

Participation in the writing and development of a Policy Brief and a Toolkit based on the Collaborative Climate Laboratories (CiCli-Labs) implemented in this project.

The impact of NGDOs' non-formal education practices for social transformation, within the framework of the EDCG in Portugal

LIDA -Learning Inclusion in a Digital Age: to Belong and Find a Voice in a Changing Europe

The professional is political: professional activism in educational, social and community intervention [O profissional é político: o ativismo profissional na intervenção educativa, social e comunitária]

ADVENUS - Developing on-line training resources for adult refugees

REGAP - Reducing the Educational Gap for Migrants and Refugees

NPS in Europe - New Psychoactive Substances among People who use drugs heavily - towards effective and comprehensive health responses in Europe

Porto G - Education for health and citizenship in sex work [Educação para a saúde e cidadania no âmbito do trabalho sexual]

CHECK!N Lisbon - project to reduce the risks of drug use and sexuality in party contexts

CHECK!N Viseu - project to reduce the risks of drug use and sexuality in party contexts

INDOORS - Empowerment and Skill Building Tools for National and Migrant Female Sex Workers Working in Hidden Places

INDOORS - Empowerment and Skill Building Tools for National and Migrant Female Sex Workers Working in Hidden Places

Porto G - Education for health and citizenship in sex work [Educação para a saúde e cidadania no âmbito do trabalho sexual]

INDOORS - Support and Empowerment for Female Sex Workers and Trafficked Women Working in Hidden Places

NEWIP - Nightlife Empowerment & Well-being Implementation Project

CHECK!N Viseu - Harm reduction in party settings [Redução de riscos em contextos festivos]

CHECK!N - Harm reduction in party settings [Redução de riscos em contextos festivos]

CHECK!N - Harm reduction in party settings [Redução de riscos em contextos festivos]