Lisbon metropolitan area
The Lisbon metropolitan area, centered in the Portuguese capital city of Lisbon, is the largest population concentration in Portugal. The population in 2011 was 2,821,876, of whom 547,733 (19.4%) live in the city of Lisbon. About 26.7% of the total population of Portugal lives in the Lisbon metropolitan area. The area of the Lisbon metropolitan area is 3,015.24 km, which is 3.3% of the total area of Portugal.
Higher education in Portugal
Portugal has two main systems of higher education:The state-run universities ("Universidades") are governed by a Rector, and are groupings of faculties, and university institutes, departments or schools. They have been created mostly in the most populated and industrialized areas near the coast (although strategically balanced with three establishments opened after 1970 in the northern, central and southern interior regions), being established in the main cities. Two of these universities are located in the Azores and Madeira Islands, and the remaining eleven in Continental Portugal. Three of them are located in Lisbon, the capital of Portugal (four considering also the Lisbon University Institute ISCTE, a large public university institute). Public universities have full autonomy in the creation and delivery of degree programmes, which are to be registered at DGES - "Direcção-Geral do Ensino Superior" (State Agency for Higher Education). Universities are regulated by the Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education, and are represented as a whole by the "CRUP - Conselho de Reitores das Universidades Portuguesas".