Introduction
The successful experience built since 2002, through a partnership initially established between São João da Barra town and the former Federal Center for Technological Education from Campos (CEFET Campos in Portuguese), for the training of tourism technicians, stimulated the inclusion, in its Institutional Development Plan (In Portuguese, PDI - 2004/2008), of new partnerships with municipalities in order to expand vocational training and technological diffusion, which aimed to broaden the role of this educational institution as a participant in local and regional development.
Thus, the CEFET Campos Expansion Program was established, which consisted of disseminating vocational training through the implementation of Advanced Centers in several towns in the countryside of Rio de Janeiro state. In addition to São João da Barra town, advanced nuclei were implanted in Arraial do Cabo and Quissamã.
CEFET Campos, in order to implement the program, directed its efforts to bring closer young and adult workers from districts disadvantaged of vocational and technological education by our historical units, based in Campos and Macaé. In this sense, it was intended to reverse the paths of citizens in the search for professional qualification, that is, instead of the citizen having to move to one of our units, professional and technological education would be available closer to their place of residence.
Especially São João da Barra town, due to the policy defended by its managers, produced different agreements for the training of High School technical professionals: a total of 160 graduates, being 28 in tourism in 2006; 47 in industrial computing in 2009; 43 in logistics, and 42 in labor safety in 2010.
The High School technical courses in Tourism, Industrial Informatics, Labor Safety and Logistics began their classes with the support of the municipal schools Chrisanto Henrique de Souza, in Barra do Açu; Elysio de Magalhães, in Barcelos and Domingos Fernandes da Costa, at the municipality's headquarters. In addition to the schools, the Sabonete District Cityt Hall also received students.
São João da Barra town, in partnership with IFF, decides to take a bold step towards providing its citizens with quality professional and technological training. The action is motivated by the results achieved with the professional and technological training provided by the institution in the town; by the words of the former President of the Republic, Luís Inácio Lula da Silva, at the inauguration of Cabo Frio campus in March 2009; and also by economic and social growth expected for the region due to investments in the construction of the Açu Port Complex. In order to do so, an area of 90 thousand square meters was made available and, following current legislation, the construction of a Municipal School of Vocational Technical Education was contracted, whose cornerstone was launched on April 28, 2009. Total investment for such achievement is approximately R$ 7.3 million.
As an emergency, so that the process of professional and technological training would not go through any discontinuity, São João da Barra town contracted the implantation of a pre-molded unit, composed of two classrooms, two computer labs, a designing room, administrative rooms and a cafeteria. The inauguration of this unit, where the Advanced Nucleus of São João da Barra worked, was held on July 4, 2011 and the beginning of the High School technical courses in Metallurgy and Electromechanics took place in August. With the advent of the National Program for Access to Vocational Education and Employment (Pronatec in Portuguese) and the Program Mulheres Mil, this unit was expanded in 2012 to welcome new classes.
At the same time, the municipal government and IFFluminense continued the process of implementation of the future campus headquarters. On June 10, 2014, the federal government authorized the operation of São João da Barra Advanced Campus through Ordinance N. 505/2014.
São João da Barra advanced campus aims at offering High School technical and professional education, training ethical citizens and professionals, who are recognized as subjects in the defense of life inside the work world dynamics, focusing on a comprehensive social and economical development in the territory of its scope.
Currently, it has 155 students and 34 employees (19 teachers and 15 administrative staff) and it offers High-School-Integrated to Vocational Training Courses and one High-School-Concurrent Vocational Training Course, whose training has a strong humanist, scientific and technological foundation, which allows the student a critical and investigative attitude which favors a reading of the complex world where they live and encourages them to a competent and ethical intervention and to a constant improvement.
In 2015, the unit also started to offer Technical Courses Integrated to High School by Technological Axes: Control and Industrial Processes and Industrial Production and the Technical Course in Electromechanics.