Erasmus+ Cooperation Partnerships for higher education

19-01-2022

From March till June 2023, Higher Education Institutions can apply for funding for international cooperation projects within the Erasmus+ programme. In a new series of articles the experts of Nehem will present Erasmus+ Key Actions and calls that provide various funding opportunities in the field of Higher Education.

What does the Erasmus+ programme look like?

Erasmus+ is the EU programme for education, training, youth and sport. The programme is divided into three different programmes or Key Actions, of which we will highlight the Key Actions that provide the best funding opportunities, starting with Key Action 2:

Key Action 2 Cooperation among organisations and institutions

This key action supports the following actions:

Partnerships for Cooperation
Partnerships for Excellence
Partnerships for Innovation
Capacity Building.

These actions provide various funding opportunities for higher education institutions that want to strengthen or further develop their education programmes in collaboration with other Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) or professional partners. In this article we will focus on ‘Partnerships for Cooperation’.

About Erasmus+ Cooperation Partnerships

Erasmus+ Cooperation Partnerships are aimed at establishing or strengthening partnerships between European organisations, specifically in the field of education. Setting up and participating in such a partnership is a good opportunity for HEIs that intend to use international collaboration to develop or modernise education programmes or education curricula. Think of the development of new educational modules, training modules for teachers or the strengthening of the link between education and professional practice.

What kind of collaboration is this?

The Erasmus+ programme has two types of Partnerships for Cooperation:

small-scale partnerships for small projects
cooperation partnerships for larger projects.

To be eligible for this grant, a collaboration project must meet various conditions. Below we briefly present the main points:

	Small-scale partnerships	Cooperation partnerships
Project objectives	strengthening higher education programmes by addressing common challenges and developing innovative solutions addressing EU-objectives like strengthening Inclusion & Diversity, Environment & Climate protection, improving Quality Assurance in education, or better aligning education and training with the (changing) labour market.
Eligible costs	The funding contributes to the direct project costs. This may concern, for example: project management (administrative tasks, meetings, development of means of communication) implementation activities (such as development costs and network meetings) organising conferences and events to promote and share project results.
Consortium	at least two organisations from at least two different countries	at least three organisations from at least three different countries
Project duration	between 6 to 24 months	12 to 36 months

Funding amounts and application rounds

The amount of funding depends on the type of collaboration and the overall project costs. Funding is done via lump sum financing:

small-scale partnerships involve lump sum grants of 30,000 and 60,000 euros
cooperation partnerships involve higher amounts: 120,000; 250,000 and 400,000 euros.

Grant applications can only be submitted within official rounds. The deadlines for the 2023 application rounds are the following:

22 March (for both Cooperation Partnerships Higher Education and Small-Scale Partnerships)
4 October (only for Small-Scale Partnerships).

What can Nehem do for you?

Is your organisation active in the field of higher education, and do you have plans or ideas for a collaborative project that fits the description above? Would you like to receive more information about the grant opportunities, the type of Cooperation Partnership and funding that best fits your project proposal? And how to set up a good collaboration project? Get in touch with our Erasmus+ experts. They have extensive experience in developing, writing and reviewing projects. Call 088-838 13 81 or fill out the form: