Portuguese curriculum policies are inspired by the discourse of international policies that recommend schools greater autonomy. In Portugal, since 2017, measures have been implemented around curriculum autonomy and flexibility. In this article, we seek to understand the legal-normative framework of Curricular Autonomy and Flexibility (AFC), evident in the educational guidelines of the Students' Profile by the End of Compulsory Schooling, the Basic and Secondary Education Curriculum, Essential Learning, the National Education Strategy for Citizenship, Inclusive Education and the National Program for the Promotion of School Success. We carried out an exploratory study, of a qualitative nature, based on a descriptive and interpretive approach, centered on a single case study – the normative dimension of AFC in Portugal. Document analysis is used as a data collection technique and as data analysis and treatment techniques, content analysis and the triangulation of referenced standards. In terms of the intentions declared in the educational policy narrative, innovative measures are recommended in the curricular and pedagogical domains, with a view to improving and quality of teaching and learning, invoking in the authors' understanding the need to deepen substantive processes of school autonomy in a educational administration model that in Portugal remains centralized and deconcentrated.
https://doi.org/10.15366/reice2021.19.2.003