International partnership programmes and international conventions or agreements in higher education include:
Portugal is a signatory of the Bologna process and therefore belongs to the European Higher Education Area. (see Higher education in Portugal#European Higher Education Area)
Portugal is an active member of Socrates programme and Erasmus programme exchange scheme.
Programa MIT-Portugal: is a partnership in graduate education and research in advanced systems engineering, bioengineering, energy and transportation systems, and also in management, involving the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (U.S.A.), Portuguese universities, other research institutions, and companies. Mariano Gago the Portuguese Minister of Science Technology and Higher Education said, in his perspective, about MIT-Portugal programme: "The worst (higher education institutions) should learn and the best should be ready to face the challenges". The institutions in this programme include: the Instituto Superior de Ciências do Trabalho e da Empresa (only in management), Minho University, New University of Lisbon, Catholic University of Portugal (only in management), Technical University of Lisbon, University of Coimbra, and the University of Porto. The program includes companies like Volkswagen's AutoEuropa, Amorim, and Simoldes, among others. The project is financed by the Government of Portugal and participants were selected by the Portuguese Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education based on multicriteria MIT's evaluation of the Portuguese institutions.
Programa CMU-Portugal: is a partnership in information technology and communications, part of the national policy for the hi-tech boom, involving the Carnegie Mellon University (U.S.A.) and several Portuguese institutions including companies, such as Portugal Telecom, Siemens, Novabase and Critical Software, the eight faculties and colleges that integrate various research centres involved in the CMU-Portugal Program: Faculty of Sciences of Lisbon University, School of Engineering of Minho University, Faculty of Sciences and Technology of the New University of Lisbon, Faculty of Sciences and Technology of the University of Coimbra, Faculty of Economical and Enterprise Sciences of the Catholic University of Portugal, Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto, Instituto Superior de Engenharia do Porto (IPP), and Instituto Superior Técnico (UTL). It also includes several other higher education institutions, such as the universities of Aveiro, Beira Interior and Algarve. This project will be financed by the national government and major hi-tech companies.
Programa UTAustin-Portugal is a partnership in graduate education and research involving the University of Texas at Austin (U.S.A.), several Portuguese universities, other research institutions and companies, including: the Instituto de Engenharia de Sistemas e Computadores do Porto, Instituto de Medicina Molecular, Instituto Pedro Nunes, University of Porto, New University of Lisbon, University of Aveiro, University of Coimbra, University of Lisbon, Instituto Superior de Ciências do Trabalho e da Empresa, and the Instituto Superior Técnico of the Technical University of Lisbon.
Portuguese higher education students may be eligible to benefit from agreements with a number of other noted foreign universities and research organizations like the Harvard University, the European Space Agency (ESA), the European Laboratory for Particle Physics (CERN), the ITER, and the European Southern Observatory (ESO).
The Lisbon MBA, an International MBA program offered in tie up of two leading Portuguese universities (UNL and UCP) in collaboration with the MIT Sloan School of Management gained lot of attention among the international students and received positive feedback.
Harvard Medical School-Portugal, a program that facilitates new translational and clinical research, and will launch and streamline post-graduate medical training, and produce and publish quality medical and health information in Portugal.