Instituto Superior de Engenharia do Porto

The Instituto Superior de Engenharia do Porto (ISEP) or Porto Superior Institute of Engineering is a public polytechnic

Polytechnic (Portugal)

A polytechnic is a higher education educational institution in Portugal created in the 1980s. After 1998 they were upgraded to institutions which are allowed to confer licenciatura degrees. Before then, they only awarded short-cycle degrees which were known as bacharelatos and didn't provide...

higher learning

Higher education

Higher, post-secondary, tertiary, or third level education refers to the stage of learning that occurs at universities, academies, colleges, seminaries, and institutes of technology...

and research institute of engineering

Engineering

Engineering is the discipline, art, skill and profession of acquiring and applying scientific, mathematical, economic, social, and practical knowledge, in order to design and build structures, machines, devices, systems, materials and processes that safely realize improvements to the lives of...

, located in the city of Porto

Porto

Porto , also known as Oporto in English, is the second largest city in Portugal and one of the major urban areas in the Iberian Peninsula. Its administrative limits include a population of 237,559 inhabitants distributed within 15 civil parishes...

, Portugal

Portugal

Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...

. ISEP has eight departments and one section, with an emphasis on applied science and technology.

ISEP was founded by the minister Fontes Pereira de Melo

Fontes Pereira de Melo

António Maria de Fontes Pereira de Melo GCTE KGF was a Portuguese statesman, politician, and engineer. He was the son of João de Fontes Pereira de Melo and wife and first cousin Jacinta Venância Rosa da Cunha Matos...

in 1852 as Escola Industrial do Porto (Porto School of Industry) to support the industrialization of Portugal

Portugal

, and some time later upgraded to Instituto Industrial do Porto (Porto Institute of Industry). Since 1989, was grouped with other schools in the Polytechnic Institute of Porto. Its motto is Saber Fazer — "Knowing how to do".

Today, ISEP is one of the biggest engineering schools of Portugal, with around 6,000 students and 500 faculty members. It has research facilities for real-time systems, artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence is the intelligence of machines and the branch of computer science that aims to create it. AI textbooks define the field as "the study and design of intelligent agents" where an intelligent agent is a system that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its...

, knowledge based systems, and decision support system

Decision support system

A decision support system is a computer-based information system that supports business or organizational decision-making activities. DSSs serve the management, operations, and planning levels of an organization and help to make decisions, which may be rapidly changing and not easily specified in...

s, some of them accredited by the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia of the Portuguese Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education (i.e. GECAD).

History

The institution had several names and roles since its foundation in 1852:

1852 The Escola Industrial do Porto (School of Industry) is founded by the minister Fontes Pereira de Melo
Fontes Pereira de Melo
António Maria de Fontes Pereira de Melo GCTE KGF was a Portuguese statesman, politician, and engineer. He was the son of João de Fontes Pereira de Melo and wife and first cousin Jacinta Venância Rosa da Cunha Matos...

, during the reign of King Pedro V of Portugal
Pedro V of Portugal
* Duke of Barcelos* Marquis of Vila Viçosa* Count of Ourém* Count of Barcelos* Count of Arraiolos* Count of Guimarães-Honours:* Knight of the Garter* Knight of the Golden Fleece-Ancestry:...

.
1864 The school was transformed into an Institute, as Instituto Industrial do Porto (Institute of Industry), and was integrated into the new Industrial sector on the frame of the Instituto Industrial de Lisboa established in Lisbon
Lisbon
Lisbon is the capital city and largest city of Portugal with a population of 545,245 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Lisbon extends beyond the administrative city limits with a population of 3 million on an area of , making it the 9th most populous urban...

.
1905 It was allowed to provide higher education
Higher education
Higher, post-secondary, tertiary, or third level education refers to the stage of learning that occurs at universities, academies, colleges, seminaries, and institutes of technology...

(ensino superior).
1918 The institute was reorganized and transformed again into a non-higher education technical institute of intermediate education (ensino médio) by the minister Azevedo Neves reforms. It started coferring the titles of engenheiro auxiliar (auxiliary engineer) by law Lei 1 638 de 23 de Julho de 1924 in 1924, and agente técnico de engenharia (technical agent of engineering) from 1926 onwards.
1975 After the Carnation Revolution
Carnation Revolution
The Carnation Revolution , also referred to as the 25 de Abril , was a military coup started on 25 April 1974, in Lisbon, Portugal, coupled with an unanticipated and extensive campaign of civil resistance...

of 1974, the institute was upgraded to higher education status and started to award 4-year bacharelato degrees conferring the title of technical engineer (engenheiro técnico). Integrated into the university sector and renamed ISEP - Instituto Superior de Engenharia do Porto (Superior Institute of Engineering), it coferred short cycle technical engineering degrees while the universities awarded 5-year engineer degrees.
1989 By force of decree law Decreto-Lei n.º 389/88, de 25 de Outubro (1988), ISEP was integrated into the newly created polytechnic
Polytechnic (Portugal)
A polytechnic is a higher education educational institution in Portugal created in the 1980s. After 1998 they were upgraded to institutions which are allowed to confer licenciatura degrees. Before then, they only awarded short-cycle degrees which were known as bacharelatos and didn't provide...

sector and made part of the Polytechnic Institute of Porto. It started to award exclusively 3-year bacharelato degrees conferring the title of technical engineer (engenheiro técnico) and CESE (Curso de Estudos Superiores Especializados) courses conferring the DESE (Diploma de Estudos Superiores Especializados) diploma, a complementary diploma to the bacharelato degree.
1998 ISEP started to award licenciatura bietápica degrees (3-year bacharelato plus 2 extra years conferring the licenciatura, equivalent to the licenciatura (licentiate
Licentiate
Licentiate is the title of a person who holds an academic degree called a licence. The term may derive from the Latin licentia docendi, meaning permission to teach. The term may also derive from the Latin licentia ad practicandum, which signified someone who held a certificate of competence to...

) degree which until then had been awarded only by the universities).
2004 ISEP seen its first engineering licenciatura courses accredited by the Ordem dos Engenheiros
Ordem dos Engenheiros
The Ordem dos Engenheiros is the regulatory and licensing body for the engineer profession in Portugal. It is headquartered in Lisbon, and has several regional branches in other Portuguese cities....

, the Portuguese engineering association. The first accredited courses were in chemical engineering and electronic engineering. Beyond the public universities, only Lisbon (ISEL) and Porto (ISEP) state-run polytechnic engineering institutions had accredited courses in the Ordem dos Engenheiros in 2006.
2007 Like the other Portuguese polytechnic institutions, on the frame of the Bologna process
Bologna process
The purpose of the Bologna Process is the creation of the European Higher Education Area by making academic degree standards and quality assurance standards more comparable and compatible throughout Europe, in particular under the Lisbon Recognition Convention...

, ISEP was allowed to start awarding independent masters' degrees as a second cycle of study after the initial 3-year first cycle which grant a licenciatura. Previously, since 2002, it only awarded masters' degrees in some fields with the support of Instituto Superior Técnico
Instituto Superior Técnico
Instituto Superior Técnico is a reputed school of engineering, part of Universidade Técnica de Lisboa . IST is the largest and the most prestigious school of engineering in Portugal...

a university engineering institution from Lisbon.

Campus

ISEP's campus spans approximately 50,000 square meters in Pólo Universitário, near São João Hospital. Dormitories and some of student life facilities are located outside the campus, but almost all classes are held on campus. ISEP campus was initially located in the central Porto and moved to current one in the 1960s.

Departments

ISEP is divided into different schools within its campus:

DEC - Civil engineering
Civil engineering
Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including works like roads, bridges, canals, dams, and buildings...
DEG - Geotechnical engineering
Geotechnical engineering
Geotechnical engineering is the branch of civil engineering concerned with the engineering behavior of earth materials. Geotechnical engineering is important in civil engineering, but is also used by military, mining, petroleum, or any other engineering concerned with construction on or in the ground...
DEQ - Chemical engineering
Chemical engineering
Chemical engineering is the branch of engineering that deals with physical science , and life sciences with mathematics and economics, to the process of converting raw materials or chemicals into more useful or valuable forms...
DEE - Electrical
Electrical engineering
Electrical engineering is a field of engineering that generally deals with the study and application of electricity, electronics and electromagnetism. The field first became an identifiable occupation in the late nineteenth century after commercialization of the electric telegraph and electrical...

and Computer engineering
Computer engineering
Computer engineering, also called computer systems engineering, is a discipline that integrates several fields of electrical engineering and computer science required to develop computer systems. Computer engineers usually have training in electronic engineering, software design, and...
DEM - Mechanical engineering
Mechanical engineering
Mechanical engineering is a discipline of engineering that applies the principles of physics and materials science for analysis, design, manufacturing, and maintenance of mechanical systems. It is the branch of engineering that involves the production and usage of heat and mechanical power for the...
DEI - Software engineering
Software engineering
Software Engineering is the application of a systematic, disciplined, quantifiable approach to the development, operation, and maintenance of software, and the study of these approaches; that is, the application of engineering to software...
DEMA - Mathematics
Mathematics
Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...
DEFI - Physics
Physics
Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...
SOG - Management
Management
Management in all business and organizational activities is the act of getting people together to accomplish desired goals and objectives using available resources efficiently and effectively...

Studies

The main studies are Software engineering

Software engineering

Software Engineering is the application of a systematic, disciplined, quantifiable approach to the development, operation, and maintenance of software, and the study of these approaches; that is, the application of engineering to software...

, Civil engineering

Civil engineering

Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including works like roads, bridges, canals, dams, and buildings...

, Chemical engineering

Chemical engineering

Chemical engineering is the branch of engineering that deals with physical science , and life sciences with mathematics and economics, to the process of converting raw materials or chemicals into more useful or valuable forms...

, Electrical engineering - Energy Systems, Electrical engineering - Electronics and Computers

Computer engineering

Computer engineering, also called computer systems engineering, is a discipline that integrates several fields of electrical engineering and computer science required to develop computer systems. Computer engineers usually have training in electronic engineering, software design, and...

(Computer Engineering), Instrumentation and Metrology engineering, Mechanical engineering

Mechanical engineering

Mechanical engineering is a discipline of engineering that applies the principles of physics and materials science for analysis, design, manufacturing, and maintenance of mechanical systems. It is the branch of engineering that involves the production and usage of heat and mechanical power for the...

, and Geotechnical engineering

Geotechnical engineering

Geotechnical engineering is the branch of civil engineering concerned with the engineering behavior of earth materials. Geotechnical engineering is important in civil engineering, but is also used by military, mining, petroleum, or any other engineering concerned with construction on or in the ground...

History

Campus

Departments

Studies

See also

General

Departments

R&D