Lisbon Theatre and Film School

As for Film Education, the corresponding degree was only set up in National Conservatoire after 1971, on a pedagogic experimental basis, in the scope of the reform process undertaken by Madalena Perdigão, in the time of Minister Veiga Simão.

46/85, of November 22 (1985), the Lisbon Theatre and Film School - that had so far been under the Directorate General of Higher Education (Direcção-Geral do Ensino Superior) and, since 1983, managed by an Organisation Committee formed by Professors Jorge Synek Listopad, President, and José Bogalheiro, member – was integrated in the Polytechnic Institute of Lisbon (IPL), a public polytechnic higher education establishment created by Decree-Law nr.

When totally new premises were built in Amadora, within the greater Lisbon area, for the Lisbon Theatre and Film School(the first building ever constructed in Portugal specifically to host a public artistic higher education establishment), it was finally possible to move from the old Caetanos' Convent (Convento dos Caetanos), in Lisbon, where Almeida Garrett´s Conservatório Geral de Arte Dramática had provisionally functioned, to modern premises designed to have adequate teaching rooms, studios, performing areas, library and cafeteria, all of which offer the best working conditions for its students.

The objectives of the Lisbon Theatre and Film School, according to its Statutes, are: Training of highly qualified professionals; research activities; artistic experiments and production; launching or participation in development projects; community involvement.

To consistently fulfil these objectives, the School has adjusted its educational provision to the Bologne Process, its two Departments offering first and second level Degrees (Graduation and Master); it set up a Research Centre which is developing projects in partnership with a similar Centre in University of Algarve; it participates in educational development programmes at local level, as for instance the programme for curriculum improvement activities in public basic schools in the Amadora municipality, and annually produces and organises, in its own premises as well as in Theatres, Museums, Cinemas and other public spaces, numbers of performances and exhibitions of its students´ dramatic and cinema practical works, attendance to all events being free to the community.