Re-Start Guidebook for Business Startups

The first English versions of the Re-Start Guidebook for business startups designed specifically for refugees and migrants are now online in flip book format. The guidebooks go through all you need to do to launch a company in Belgium, Finland, Portugal and Spain. Tomorrow we will have the translated versions and PDF downloads. Have a sneak peek now and let us know what you think: https://projectrestart.eu/the-restart-guidebook/

Workshop about Taxes – IRS (Portuguese Income Tax)

This workshop will be conducted in both Portuguese and English. Our news this year? Our workshops! Stay tuned and you will learn and gain vital knowledge on important topics when living in or moving to Portugal. In order to help all foreigners who move their lives to Portugal and work here and pay taxes, TropicalAstral have prepared workshops that will help you better understand what is necessary when living and working here, what the rules and obligations are, and what benefits there are for you in your host country. Several workshops will be prepared throughout the year, related to various topics such as taxes, services, driving licenses, social security and its benefits, and much more! Our first workshop is in April on the topic of the IRS and your tax return! On 20th April, for 4 hours, you will learn about everything you need to know to better understand and complete your annual tax return and prepare your IRS for the year of 2024 more efficiently. Did you know, for example, that you can save up to €3,000 a year in taxes if you do it right? Did you also know that as a resident of Portugal, you can reduce your IRS or even be refunded if you benefit from some tax deductions. Expenses you incur in 2023 related to education, health, real estate, child support, nursing homes, VAT, and other general family expenses qualify for IRS tax deductions in 2023, and may result in benefits for you when you file your declaration in 2024? In this workshop you can find out how to benefit from these deductions from the IRS and what the limits are for each category. You will learn, for example, how expenses with veterinarians, hairdressers, and the maintenance of your vehicle can, and should, be placed on your portal. All these tips will be passed on to you during this workshop and we are sure they will be extremely useful! During the session you can ask any questions you want and get all your doubts clarified. The cost of this workshop is €100 per person, and includes 5 learning modules related to IRS, the Finanças Portal, e-Fatura platform, and much more. The value of these workshops compared to what you can save and learn will be of great value to you! Join us and learn that managing your finance portal well will only bring you benefits! Places are limited, so we suggest that you contact us at: sofia@tropicalastral.com requesting more information and to register as soon as possible, the deadline for registrations is 15th April 2023. Let us help you understand the important rules and systems in Portugal. Contact us, register, and be surprised with what you learn, and with the improvements of the management of your accounts, witness the savings you can achieve!

Pro-Digita Project update – March 2023

The Pro-Digita project supports the intentional use of digital technologies in education and training. This includes developing digital pedagogy and expertise in using digital tools for instructors of adults, including accessible and assistive technologies, and the innovative creation and use of digital educational content. The objectives of the project are to increase the digital transformation of trainers and learners through the development of digital capacity, to improve the skills of trainers and learners in online education and to improve accessibility in online education for adult learning. Project results include a handbook to guide adult education trainers and learners towards online education and an online platform for trainers and trainees, to be used in online education. To increase interaction between adult learning organisations that will benefit from these outputs and other projects, a vast network of contacts will be built throughout the project timeline. At this stage, the creation of the didactic material in English has been fully completed and the translations to Portuguese, Turkish, Spanish and Lithuanian are finalised. Furthermore, our Online Platform has been created: This Platform already has a total of 16 learning modules, all of which add up to a total of more than 100 lessons. The categories include digital resources, language learning for Portuguese, Lithuanian, Spanish and Turkish etc. All modules have been tailored for adult learning. The next step will be to create a user guide for the platform as well as a manual to guide trainers and adult learners about online education. These guides will be translated into all partner languages. TropicalAstral, coordinator of this project, as well as all the partners will present and disseminate the project and its final outputs, sharing it on all available channels such as the EPALE platform, dozens of Erasmus groups on Facebook, all partners’ websites as well as on the project website. We therefore conclude that all the outputs we set out to create in this project are following the desired course of action within the project timeline.  Don’t want to miss any updates? Like our Facebook page and visit the project website!

Skills4Integration Update – March 2023

With the project ‘Skills4Integration of Migrants, Refugees and Asylum Seekers’, we address the integration of adult refugees, asylum seekers and migrants who have notable disadvantages in literacy, numeracy and digital skills. Within the scope of the project, we are creating a web-based platform that contains numerous lessons on these topics, including interactive exercises and video lessons. Also, a training manual will be created to support volunteer educators of adult migrants and refugees. By this point, the creation of the learning material in English has been completed fully and translations to Finnish, Portuguese, Greek, French and Dutch are progressing. There will be 30 lessons for each topic – language learning, digital skills and maths – available with topics ranging from following a recipe, job application & citizenship over creating an email account, creating flyers & keyboard shortcuts to basic calculations, money management & statistics. All of them will be available both on the interactive Web APP and as downloadable PDFs that can be printed. The development of the Web APP interface has been completed and our staff has gone through training for uploading the interactive lessons. Uploads for the English lessons have been initiated and are now in full swing – to be followed by Portuguese and the other languages. Here are some insights on layout and handling of the Web APP: The next step will be to create transcripts for the video modules, which will include 30 numeracy modules and 30 digital skills modules. The responsible organisation for this result will be Innovation Frontiers IKE from Greece – supported by all other partners. Once finalised, they will be made available by TropicalAstral on the Web APP. Don’t want to miss any updates? Like us on Facebook and visit the project’s website!