Portuguese colonization of the Americas by the general elections to its first "Câmara" (City Council) on August 22, 1532, is symbolically considered the birthplace of democracy in the Americas. From 1534 to 1536, 15 Captaincy colonies were created in Portuguese America. The captaincies were autonomous, and mostly private, colonies of the Portuguese Empire, each owned and run by a Captain-major. In 1549, due to their failure and limited success, the Captaincy Colonies of Brazil were united into the Governorate General of Brazil. The captaincy colonies were reorganized as provincial districts to the Governorate. The captaincies continued to be ruled by their hereditary captain-majors but they
Portuguese in the United Kingdom the British education system, difficulties in speaking English, poor school attendance, poverty, interrupted prior education, negative teacher perceptions, poor school to home liaison and lack of exposure to written language". The research evidence from Lambeth shows that Portuguese pupils with poor English fluency perform poorly in educational terms, but that those who are fluent in English actually perform better than national averages. There are plans to open a bilingual school, approved by the Department for Education and will be called the Anglo-Portuguese School of London. With the great number of Madeirans in the UK, Madeira Day and Portugal Day are