European Universities Alliances
26 June 2019
On 26 June, the European Commission published the results of the first round of European Universities Alliances applications.
On 12 June, the Directorate-General Education and Culture organised a Stakeholder meeting, at which Ms Vanessa Debiais-Sainton, Head of Unit, informed that the European Commission would meet with the Representatives of the Member States on 17 June 2019 to discuss the second call of the pilot phase and the potential additional support from Member States to the selected projects submitted at first call with high evaluation scores. The Chair of the Executive Board, Prof. Ludovic Thilly, participated on behalf of the Coimbra Group.
The results of the first round of applications was made public on 26 June and the involved Education Ministries have received the rankings and, in particular, information about the high-scoring Alliances, which have not been selected for funding. Each applicant will have received the evaluation summary to enable them to move forward, if relevant.
On 7 November 2019, the European Commission will invite the 17 selected Alliances to meet in Brussels to start the monitoring process; a part of this meeting will be also open to non-selected Alliances and Institutions willing to apply to the second call. It is expected that the selected Alliances will meet with the European Commission every 6 months and one site visit will be organised, but details on this are still to be established.
For the second call, a doubling of the budget for 24 additional selected Alliances is anticipated although it still needs to be approved by the Erasmus+ Committee. In the new Erasmus+ Programme (2021-2027), the initiative should continue with a new time frame of 4 years plus a possible a 3-year extension.
It is the wish of the Executive Board to continue the monitoring of developments in this initiative and to provide support to Coimbra Group members in preparation of the second call of the pilot phase: a first platform for discussion and exchanges is proposed on 4 September 2019 at a working lunch at University Foundation in Brussels. Each Coimbra Group university is invited to participate at this working lunch, regardless of being among of the selected Alliances or not, willing to apply at the second call or not. To this end, please contact the Coimbra Group Office by 12 July, at the latest.