The IFSC was created in Florianópolis by Decree 7,566, of September 23, 1909, by President Nilo Peçanha, as the Santa Catarina School of Apprentice Craftsmen. Its objective was to provide professional training to children from less favored socioeconomic classes. The first headquarters was installed on September 1, 1910, in a building provided by the state government, on Rua Almirante Alvim, in the center of the capital of Santa Catarina. In 2006, as part of the expansion plan of the Federal Network of Professional and Technological Education, Cefet-SC implemented three new teaching units. One of them, the Continente Unit, was installed on the mainland of Florianópolis, offering courses in the area of ​​tourism and hospitality. The other two units were implemented in the interior of Santa Catarina: in Chapecó, in the west, and Joinville, in the north. Also in 2006, the institution began offering a technical course in Fishing, the first in marine fishing in the country, in Itajaí, on the northern coast, linked to the Continente Unit. The seventh teaching unit of Cefet-SC began its activities in February 2008, in Araranguá, in the southern region.

The IFSC, through the national contract between CAPES and IEEE has an unlimited open access agreement with IEEE that enables researchers to publish articles as open access without open access fees in all IEEE fully and hybrid open access journals. The agreement applies to all original research articles accepted for publication between 5 November 2024 – 30 October 2027. To benefit from this agreement, the corresponding author has to be affiliated with IFSC. Please use the correct institution name and your institutional email address during submi​​ssion. It is recommended for authors to select the CC BY 4.0 license. The open access funding request will be approved by an OA administrator at CAPES. Overlength page charges or color fees are not covered by the agreement and will be charged to authors.