Alliances for Sectoral Cooperation on Skills (implementing the ‘Blueprint')

Overview

Objectives

Alliances for Sectoral Cooperation on Skills aim to create new strategic approaches and cooperation for concrete skills development solutions – both in the short and the medium term – in areas implementing a major action of the European Skills Agenda for sustainable competitiveness, social fairness and resilience, and the Pact for Skills. The large-scale partnerships under the Pact for Skills will build on the Blueprint for sectoral cooperation on skills. Therefore, Alliances under this funding call will support the implementation of the commitments under the Pact by developing sectoral skills strategies. These strategies have to lead to systemic and structural impact on reducing skills shortages, gaps and mismatches, as well as ensuring appropriate quality and levels of skills.

Activities/actions supported

Projects should implement the following activities:

• Develop a strategic approach to sectoral cooperation on skills
• Design European sector-wide agreed 'core' curricula and training programmes within the first year of activity
• Rapidly address urgent skills needs resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the digital and green transitions
• Develop occupational profiles and training content for changing and emerging occupational profiles
• Deliver 'core' curricula and training programmes
• Design a long-term action plan for the progressive roll-out of project deliverables after the project has finished

Anticipated outcomes

Alliances for Innovation will be anchored in strategic and sustainable cooperation among vocational education and training, higher education and enterprises working together to boost the innovation capacity of Europe. They will considerably strengthen the synergies between educational fields in fostering innovation, new skills, and a sense of initiative and entrepreneurial mind-sets. These Alliances among higher education, vocational education and training, and enterprises are expected to contribute to the development of regional eco-systems and directly provide a valuable input to the economy, integrating work based learning.

Institution providing the funding

European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA)

Size of funding

EUR 4,000,000

Conditions

Overview of eligibility criteria

In order to be eligible, applicants must be partners in a large-scale skills partnership under the Pact for Skills. Moreover, please note the following:

• Any full partner legally established in an EU Member State or third country associated to the Erasmus+ Programme can be the applicant.
• Alliances for Sectoral Cooperation on Skills must cover at least 8 EU Member States and third countries associated to the Programme and involve at least 12 full partners. The partnership must include at least 5 labour market actors (enterprises or companies, or representative intermediary organisations, such as chambers, trade unions or trade associations) and at least 5 education and training providers (VET and HEIs) as full partners. There should be at least one HE institution and one VET provider involved as full partner in each proposal.
• Alliances have to choose the industrial ecosystem (among the 14 identified in the New Industrial Strategy for Europe) which their project will address.
• The following industrial ecosystems will have priority if there are no related Blueprints ongoing or if these Blueprints will end by 2023: Automotive, Textile, Renewable Energy, Electronics, Retail, Construction, Aerospace & Defence, and Energy Intensive Industries.
• The duration of the project is 4 years

Overview of award criteria

Project proposals will be assessed taking into account the following four criteria, for a maximum of 100 points:

• Relevance of the project (25 points)
• Quality of the project design and implementation (30 points)
• Quality of the partnership and the cooperation arrangements (25 points)
• Impact (20 points)

Only 1 proposal per ecosystem can be funded. To be considered for funding, proposals must score at least 70 points.

Procedures

Application procedures

Applicants must fill in a detailed budget table according to the application form via the Funding and Tenders Portal. The standard application template for Erasmus+ projects is available at this link: https://ec.europa.eu/info/funding-tenders/opportunities/docs/2021-2027/erasmus/temp-form/af/af_erasmus-bb-lsii_en.pdf

Application support available

For more information on the call and the application procedure please consult the Erasmus+ Programme Guide at https://erasmus-plus.ec.europa.eu/erasmus-programme-guide

For help related to this call, please contact: eacea-eplus-VET@ec.europa.eu

Link to funding opportunity

Link to the programme for more info