Ana Rita Calvão

O cenário da pandemia do COVID-19 teve impacto em todos os países do mundo, conduzindo a significativas mudanças com relação à organização e efetivação do trabalho por meio da adoção das modalidades de teletrabalho e home office como medidas de distanciamento físico para impedir a propagação da doença. Em Portugal, assim como em outros lugares em âmbito global, empresas foram forçadas a adotar um regime de trabalho à distância com arranjos para que o trabalho ocorresse a partir das casas dos profissionais. Este cenário motivou a presente pesquisa, que tem por finalidade identificar os aspectos gerais do teletrabalho na área do Secretariado durante a pandemia do COVID-19 em Portugal. Para isso, realizou-se uma pesquisa de natureza aplicada, com caráter exploratório e sob uma abordagem de métodos mistos para coleta e tratamento dos dados. A pesquisa contou com a participação de 66 respondentes e revelou transformações nas atividades desenvolvidas no trabalho secretarial, novas demandas para os profissionais e a necessidade de conciliar atividades inerentes ao trabalho com as rotinas da casa. Para alguns profissionais, houve melhoria na qualidade do serviço prestado, enquanto para outros respondentes fatores como isolamento social e aumento de demandas tornaram o período de teletrabalho mais difícil do que sua realização dentro das organizações.

Information about the paper titled "COLLABORATIVE LEARNING IN THE OFFICE MANAGEMENT STUDIES FIELD: A COIL EXPERIENCE BETWEEN PORTUGAL AND CABO VERDE" at IATED Digital Library

Information about the paper titled "COLLABORATIVE LEARNING AND ICT USE IN FRENCH FOR SPECIFIC PURPOSES CLASSES" at IATED Digital Library

Information about the paper titled "OUT BURNOUT - A PEDAGOGICAL STRATEGY TO COMBAT BURNOUT DURING COVID-19 - THE CASE OF ESTGA-UA STUDENTS" at IATED Digital Library

Este estudo visa relatar uma experiência de trabalho interdisciplinar desenvolvida, em agregação de competências, no contexto de duas unidades curriculares do curso de Licenciatura em Secretariado e Comunicação Empresarial (SCE), ministrado na Escola Superior de Tecnologia e Gestão de Águeda da Universidade de Aveiro (ESTGA-UA), em Portugal. Este trabalho decorreu no 1.º semestre de 2020/2021, razão pela qual a sua implementação foi influenciada pelas medidas de contenção da pandemia COVID-19. Assim, pretende-se descrever esta experiência e perceber as reações dos estudantes envolvidos ao trabalho e à metodologia propostos. Trata-se, portanto, de um estudo com uma componente descritiva, complementada por uma análise quantitativa dos dados obtidos a partir da aplicação de um questionário aos estudantes envolvidos. Os resultados deste questionário demonstram que, globalmente, os estudantes estão satisfeitos com a opção pela agregação de competências, salientando-se, porém, as dificuldades sentidas ao nível do trabalho em grupo. A experiência como um todo revelou-se menos satisfatória do que outras realizadas em contexto não pandémico, seja em termos de classificações obtidas, seja em termos de apreciação por parte dos estudantes.

This work presents the results of the analysis conducted to 844 job advertisements for secretarial/office management vacancies published in Portugal in the newspaper Jornal Expresso (paper format) between 1978 and 2018. It aims to identify these professionals' profile, from an employer's perspective, over the course of the last four decades. Presently, secretarial/office management professionals have responsibilities and attributes that differ significantly from those of the past. With this premise in mind, this work aims, on the one hand, at identifying the evolution of the age, gender, training and experience requirements published in the analysed job ads; on the other hand, it seeks to track the spectrum of skills - both technical and transversal - considered as most relevant by employers. The results confirm that fundamental changes have occurred, namely with regards to the sought professional categories, the professionals' gender, and the range of tools and techniques necessary to accomplish the required tasks, especially after the introduction and progressive demand of computer skills. Moreover, the set of the most valued transversal skills has undergone significant changes as well.

Shrubs growing in former burnt areas play two diametrically opposed roles. On the one hand, they protect the soil against erosion, promote rainwater infiltration, carbon sequestration and support animal life. On the other hand, after the shrubs’ density reaches a particular size for the canopy to touch and the shrubs’ biomass accumulates more than 10 Mg ha⁻¹, they create the necessary conditions for severe wild fires to occur and spread. The creation of a methodology suitable to identify former burnt areas and to track shrubs’ regrowth within these areas in a regular and a multi temporal basis would be beneficial. The combined use of geographical information systems (GIS) and remote sensing (RS) supported by dedicated land survey and field work for data collection has been identified as a suitable method to manage these tasks. The free access to Sentinel images constitutes a valuable tool for updating the GIS project and for the monitoring of regular shrubs’ accumulated biomass. Sentinel 2 VIS-NIR images are suitable to classify rural areas (overall accuracy = 79.6% and Cohen’s K = 0.754) and to create normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) images to be used in association to allometric equations for the shrubs’ biomass estimation (R² = 0.8984, p-value < 0.05 and RMSE = 4.46 Mg ha⁻¹). Five to six years after a forest fire occurrence, almost all the former burnt area is covered by shrubs. Up to 10 years after a fire, the accumulated shrubs’ biomass surpasses 14 Mg ha⁻¹. The results described in this paper demonstrate that Northwest Portugal presents larger shrubland areas and greater shrub biomass accumulation (average 18.3 Mg ha⁻¹) than the Northeast (average 7.7 Mg ha⁻¹) of the country.

With the increase of forest fires in Portugal in recent decades, a significant part of woodlands is being converted into shrubland areas. Background: From an ecological point of view, woodlands and shrublands play an essential role, as they not only prevent soil erosion and desertification, but also contribute to soil protection, habitat preservation and restoration, and also increased biodiversity for carbon sequestration. Concerning the shrublands, the assessment of their biomass is essential for evaluating the fuel load and forest fire behavior and also beneficial for obtaining estimates of carbon and biomass for energy use. Methods: In this study, we collected data about the potential shrub biomass accumulation along fifteen years in former burnt areas within North Portugal. Results: The achieved results showed that for a post-fire period ranging from one to 15 years, the accumulated shrubs’ biomass ranged from 0.12 up to 28.88 Mg ha⁻¹. The model developed to estimate the shrub biomass using the time after a fire (age) as a predictor variable presented a high adjustment to data (p-value of the F statistic 2 = 0.89), allowing estimating shrub biomass regeneration within former burnt areas with an RMSE of 3.31 Mg ha⁻¹. Conclusions: This paper provides practical information on the availability and assessment of shrub biomass in North Portugal, highlighting the suitability of shrubs as potential sources of biomass.

Information about the paper titled "DEVELOPING BUSINESS ENGLISH COMMUNICATION SKILLS AND INTERCULTURAL COMPETENCE: A STUDENT-CENTRED APPROACH" at IATED Digital Library

Information about the paper titled "PEDAGOGICAL PRACTICES IN HIGHER EDUCATION: IMPROVING STUDENTS’ COMPETENCES THROUGH CROSS-CURRICULAR PROBLEM-SOLVING ACTIVITIES" at IATED Digital Library