Erasmus+ Partnerships for Innovation and Excellence

Partnerships for Innovation

Partnerships for Innovation are open to projects that aim at achieving systemic impact in terms of contributing to growth and competitiveness and social cohesion at European level. These partnerships should have the capacity to deploy the project outcomes on a European scale and/or by being able to transfer them into different thematic or geographical contexts.

This type of partnerships comprises two calls, the Alliances for Education and Enterprises and the Forward-Looking Projects:

• Alliances for Education and Enterprises aim to strengthen Europe’s innovation capacity by boosting innovation through cooperation and flow of knowledge among higher education (HE), vocational education and training (VET), and the broader socio-economic environment, including research. They aim to boost the provision of new skills (such as green and digital skills) and address skills mismatches by designing and creating new curricula for higher education and vocational education and training, supporting the development of a sense of initiative and entrepreneurial mind-set in the EU.

The average project duration is between 24 to 36 months and the average grant amount is between 1 million and 1.5 million euros. The deadline is 3 May 2023.

• Forward-looking projects provide funding to large-scale projects that aim to identify, develop, test and/or assess innovative (policy) approaches that have the potential of becoming mainstreamed. Projects aim to improve education and training systems and bring a substantial innovative effect in terms of methods and practices to all types of learning and active participation settings for Europe’s social cohesion. Applicants can apply for funding under the following categories:
  • Adult Education
  • Adult Learning
  • Cross-sectoral Priorities
  • Digital Education
  • Vocational Education and Training.

The average project duration for this type of partnerships is between 24 to 48 months and the average grant is between 1 million and 1.5 million euros. The deadline is 15 March 2023.

Partnerships for Excellence

The Partnerships for Excellence support projects with a long-term sustainable perspective. The following actions are supported under this type of partnerships:

• Centres for vocational excellence: this action supports the gradual establishment and development of international collaborative networks of Centres of Vocational Excellence (CoVE), contributing to creating skills ecosystems for innovation, regional development, and social inclusion. These CoVEs operate at two levels:
  • national: involving a wide range of local stakeholders creating skills ecosystems for local innovation, regional development, and social inclusion, while working with CoVEs in other countries through international collaborative networks.
  • international: bringing together CoVEs that share a common interest in:
    • specific sectors
    • innovative approaches to tackle economic and societal challenges (e.g. climate change, digitalisation, artificial intelligence, sustainable development goals, integration of migrants and disadvantaged groups, upskilling people with low qualification levels, and so on), or innovative approaches to increase the outreach, quality and effectiveness of existing CoVEs.

The maximum project duration is 48 months, and the maximum grant amount is 4 million euros. Eligible project partners are both national and international VET institutions. The deadline is 8 June 2023.

• Erasmus Mundus:
  • Erasmus Mundus Joint Masters (EMJM): are high-level and integrated study programmes, at master level. This action aims at fostering excellence and worldwide internationalisation of higher education institutions via study programmes – at master course level – jointly delivered and jointly recognised by HEIs established in Europe, and open to institutions in other countries of the world. An EMJM involves at least three HEIs from three different countries, of which at least two must be EU Member States and third countries associated to the Programme.

The project duration is six academic years, covering at least four editions of the master programme. The grant per project is up to 5 million euros. An EMJM enrols excellent students worldwide. The deadline is 16 February 2023.