NAU

NAU is Portugal's national platform for open online courses. Its About page calls it "an online project, pioneering at Portuguese national level, to support education and training, aimed at large audiences", and explains that it is "a service developed and managed by the FCCN Unit of the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) that allows the creation of courses in MOOC format (Massive Open Online Course), that is, courses open and accessible to all, produced by recognized and relevant entities in society, with the participation of thousands of people." The site's slogan is "Sempre a aprender!" (always learning), and it runs in Portuguese and English.

For a learner, NAU is a catalog of open courses from Portuguese universities, polytechnics, public bodies and a few companies. For an institution, it is a publishing channel: the footer links a "How to become a partner" page, and the partners page ends with "Join us!".

Mission and funding

The About page places NAU inside a national program: "This platform is part of the transversal actions of the Portugal INCoDe.2030 initiative by promoting digital development, digital inclusion and literacy, education and qualification of the active population." Funding, it says, "comes from the European Regional Development Fund of the European Union and the COMPETE 2020 Community Operational Program, within the framework of the Portugal 2020 Framework."

The vision is stated in three lines: "To be the reference platform for Portuguese-speaking knowledge", to foster "the production of content relevant to society, namely by encouraging requalification and lifelong learning", and "To open up new worlds, creating constant and innovative routes of knowledge of Lusophony, taking advantage of the effect of scale." The objectives are to "Enable education and training to extended communities of users", "Promote a culture of knowledge and continuous learning, particularly in the Portuguese population" and "Stimulate digital literacy." For anyone curious about scale, the About page points to an interactive NAU Dashboard with the platform's numbers.

What a learner finds

Courses

Course cards show the course name, the institution behind it, a short course code and an enrollment status such as "Open for enrollment" or "Archived". The English home page features Introduction to Artificial Intelligence from ARTE | Academia Portugal Digital, Literacy in AI Translation for Healthcare Settings from Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, Exploring the Mysteries of Life: An Introduction to Cell Biology from Universidade do Porto, and The Earth System as Global Common from Common Home of Humanity, the last one archived. The Portuguese home page features a different set: mobile app programming (Programação para Dispositivos Móveis) from Instituto Politécnico de Lisboa, a generative AI certification course (Certificação em IA Generativa) from the Data Science Portuguese Association, digital services for higher education and research from FCT, and cybersecurity incident response from ARTE | Academia Portugal Digital.

The news section adds literature. It highlights two courses led by Professor Carlos Reis, "Eça de Queirós: romance e representação social" and "José Saramago: viagem, ficção, figuras", with enrollment open, and a sustainability day article that points readers to NAU's free courses on sustainability ("cursos gratuitos da NAU sobre sustentabilidade"). The main menu also lists Programs alongside Courses.

Courses from the National Institute of Administration

INA, the National Institute of Administration, is a founding partner, and its partner page explains how its courses work. The page states that "Os cursos e-learning do INA presentes na plataforma NAU são em língua portuguesa, abertos ao público em geral e concebidos de forma a promover uma aprendizagem dinâmica e estimulante": INA's e-learning courses on NAU are in Portuguese, open to the general public and designed to make learning lively and engaging. The exception is any course marked "Administração Pública", which is reserved for people working in the public administration, from central and local government to public companies and associations. The main menu also carries an "Espaço AP", a space for the public administration.

INA's open courses listed on the page cover electronic identification and certification (eID e Certificação Eletrónica), concepts and principles of public participation, the future of cities and the EU, the pillars of sustainability, literacy on racism and racial discrimination, intercultural skills, how the European Union is built and run, and data protection for citizens (RGPD para Cidadãos Atentos). The page also presents the subject-matter experts behind them, including a lawyer and legal consultant on public contracts and IT, a specialist in multicultural social and education projects, and a lecturer at the Instituto Politécnico de Bragança.

Who publishes on NAU

The partners page opens with "NAU has several partners, both from the Portuguese Public Administration, Higher Education and Private Entities." The founding partners are the Instituto de Educação, Qualidade e Avaliação, INA, the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, the Direção-Geral da Saúde (the health directorate), the Instituto do Emprego e Formação Profissional and the Secretaria-Geral da Educação e Ciência.

The full list is long and varied. Higher education is represented by Universidade de Lisboa, Universidade do Porto, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, Universidade de Aveiro, Universidade do Minho, Universidade de Évora, Universidade da Beira Interior, Universidade Aberta, ISCTE, Porto Business School, several polytechnics and two nursing schools. Public bodies include the Centro Nacional de Cibersegurança, the Gabinete Nacional de Segurança, the Instituto Português do Desporto e Juventude, Turismo de Portugal and the national fire service school. Cultural foundations such as the Fundação José Saramago, Fundação Eça de Queiroz and Fundação Amália Rodrigues appear too, along with companies and associations including Accenture, DECO, CENJOR for journalists and the Data Science Portuguese Association. That breadth is the platform's strength: the same catalog holds a cybersecurity course from a national security body and literature courses on Saramago and Eça de Queirós.

Policies and support

The footer links Help, News, a Media kit, a Site Map, an Accessibility page and an Open source page, plus the legal set: Terms and Conditions, Privacy Policy, Cookies Policy, a Certification Policy and Newsletter consent. The certification policy is the page that sets out the platform's rules on certification.

Who it suits

NAU suits Portuguese-speaking learners who want open courses from recognized Portuguese institutions: university-level introductions to subjects like cell biology or AI, practical digital skills such as mobile programming and cybersecurity incident response, and civic topics from the public administration's own training institute. Public servants get a dedicated strand of INA courses reserved for them. Universities, public bodies and organizations that want to publish open courses in Portuguese have a national channel with a clear route to becoming a partner.

Most courses are in Portuguese, so the platform offers less to learners who do not read the language, even though the interface and some featured courses are in English.