Madrid, July 27, 2022. The European Commission has announced the results of the 2022 call of the European Universities Initiative, with which seven Spanish universities will join alliances of European universities. 4 new alliances are created, in which 4 Spanish universities will participate, and 16 alliances of European Universities selected in the 2019 call will receive further financial support and will increase the number of participating universities in their consortia, among them, 3 Spanish universities. Together with the 24 alliances selected in 2020, they make a total of 44 European University alliances in which 340 European higher education institutions from 31 countries, including the EU Member States, Iceland, Norway, Serbia and Turkey, will participate.
Margaritis Schinas, Vice President of the European Commission, has expressed his conviction that «together, the European Universities will bring higher education in Europe to a new level». For her part, Mariya Gabriel, Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth, assured that these results bring us «closer to achieving our vision for the higher education sector in Europe: campuses that span between universities and cross borders and disciplines, where students, staff and researchers from all parts of Europe can enjoy seamless mobility, and create new knowledge together». The commissioner has also indicated that this new call provides «higher and more long-term funding for the alliances» and ensures «an inclusive approach, giving opportunities to higher education institutions to join existing alliances or to form new ones».
With this new call, each alliance receives a budget of up to 14.4 million Euros from the Erasmus+ program for four years. This represents a significant increase compared to the maximum of 5 million Euros over three years in previous calls.
The Erasmus+ European Universities 2022 call was structured around two key themes: on the one hand, it provides sustainable funding for existing partnerships selected within the 2019 call. The 16 partnerships that have secured this additional funding will increase the number of participating universities in each consortium and will incorporate around 30 new higher education institutions.
The Spanish universities that join the existing European university alliances are IE University, which joins the CIVICA alliance (The European University of Social Sciences); the Jaume I University, which joins the EDUC (European Digital UniverCity) alliance, and the University of Alcalá, which joins the EUGLOH 2.0 alliance (European University Alliance for Global Health).
On the other hand, the call supported the creation of new European universities, bringing together various higher education institutions around common strategic visions.
Four new alliances are created, in which the following Spanish universities will participate: University of Mondragon (EU4DUAL, European Dual Studies University); the University of Extremadura (EU GREEN, European University Alliance for sustainability: responsible GRowth, including Education and ENvironment); the University of Oviedo (INGENIUM – European University), and the University of Almería (UNIgreen, The Green European University).
A novelty within the Erasmus+ 2022 call is that alliances can now accept associate partners from Bologna Process countries, including, for example, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, and Switzerland. European University Alliances will incorporate around 1,300 associated partners that include NGOs, companies, cities and local or regional authorities.
The European Commission has announced that the next Erasmus+ call will be published in Autumn 2022 to receive proposals with the aim of expanding existing alliances and creating new ones. The aim set by the European Strategy for Universities (ES4U) is to support a total of 60 alliances of European universities that will incorporate more than 500 higher education institutions by mid-2024, for which 1.1 billion Euros will be allocated from the Erasmus+ program in the current period 2021-2027. In addition, alliances will be supported for their research programs through the European Excellence Initiative within the Horizon Europe program.
Link to the European Commission’s Press Release
Factsheet of European University Alliances
