Category / EU

Welcome to the EU section of the blog! Emily Cieciura (BU’s Research Facilitator – EU and International), Jo Garrad (Funding Development Manager) and Dianne Goodman (Funding Development Co-ordinator) together try to take the pain out of finding and applying for EU funding by horizon scanning many sources and placing the most important information on this page.

We blog as often as possible on everything from calls for proposals and partner searches, to networking event opportunities, all the latest on Horizon 2020 and international funding. We also use the blog to disseminate information on EUADS (BU’s EU academic training initiative), how to write brilliant proposals, how to find partners and other top tips!

Erasmus for All update

You may remember that earlier this month I posted an update you on the latest Erasmus for All plans. Last week, the official draft of the Erasmus for All programme was published. It pretty much confirms what my previous blogpost suggested, but in case you want to read it in all its glory, you can do so here: Erasmus For All draft report 20.07.12

Finally just a reminder that the Erasmus Student Network survey is still open for responses until the end of the month if you wish to get involved, as per my previous blogpost.

 

 

FP7 ICT Internet of Things and Digital Enterprise UK Info Day

An free to attend infoday on funding opportunities under ICT Call  in the areas of the Internet of Things and digital enterprise will be held in London on 12 September 10am-4pm. It will  offer attendees the opportunity to network and share ideas as well as providing an overview of funding available in ICT Call 10 and future calls, including ongoing research, road mapping activities and collaborative groupings in Europe. While the event is free, you have to register in advance on the  the event webpage.

FP7 Social Science application top tips

If you are thinking about applying for a Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) related call under FP7 and missed the info day, fear not I have some useful tips from the day to share with you. The European Commission SSH Unit representative said that proposals should:

  • include a range of partners from different countries and show added value for each of these
  • use both qualitative and quantitative methods
  • look at projects funded on the website between 2007-10
  • not replicate previously funded projects
  • pay attention to dissemination plans (give specific info on the journals, conferences, etc)
  • demonstrate interaction between the different Work Packages
  • support Policy.

There were several other presentations on the day which you can access using via UKRO the links below:

Applying for FP7 Transport? Then read on …

Attending info days are a key way to meet potential partners and to find out more about a call, but for some busy academics there just isn’t enough time to go.  Thankfully if you missed the FP7 Transport infoday, you can download the presentations, see minutes of the Q&A for surface transport and air transport and also take a peek at the Brokerage session presentations and partner profiles.

There is also a lunchtime webinar tomorrow on the Transport Systems Catapult.  Join the live, interactive webinar chaired by Andrew Everett , Head of Transport at the Technology Strategy Board and hear an update from Daniel Ruiz , Project Manager for the Transport Systems Catapult, on the analysis of the survey results of a study to inform the enhanced business casefor the Transport System Catapult and explaining what the next steps in the process will be.

Fancy applying for FP7 Security? Need some Partners? Then you need this!

If you have been having a scan over my summarised Security Work Programme and a call has caught your eye, you can find people looking for Partners on this fantastic Security Research Projects Database, developed by the European Commission National Contact Points. A total of 251 legal entities from across Europe have so far registered on the Database, which includes 15 organisations from the UK, so it is a great opportunity for you to get your foot in the door for a FP7 Cooperation call!

 

You can also sign up to attend the free Infoday in Brussels in September on the EC website.

 

Commission seeks views on access to research infrastructure

If you get a bit cheesed off with the EC and want to have your say, then consultations are definately a great opportunity for you. There is one currently running on the follow-up to Framework 7’s “integrating activities” for research infrastructure which aims to widen access and enhance the use of research facilities that are already running in Europe and beyond. The consultation is gathering input until 22 October on possible specific topics for these activities under Horizon 2020 in 2014-20. Now’s the chance to have your say

Summarised Work Programmes now available!

Well, as I promised last week when the Work Programmes were released, I have taken the pain out of reading these for you and created summary documents. These are bookmarked so you can jump straight to the section you are interested in, see the call aims and objectives and deadline and the type of project it is without trawling through the Work Programme.

You can then look up more specifics such as the assessment criteria in the Work Programme for those calls you are interested in.

Over 1, 000 pages have been compressed in to these documents which are in subject order and on our I drive. We are the only university to offer this service so hopefully you will find this a useful one.

The Work Programme Summaries can be found in the folder: I:\R&KEO\Public\RDU\Final Work Programme Summaries 2012

 

Joint Programming: Healthy Diet for a Healthy Life Strategic Research Agenda Published

The Joint Programming Initiative (JPI) on A Healthy Diet for a Healthy Life (HDHL) has published its Strategic Research Agenda (SRA) at a recent conference in The Hague. The JPI HDHL has also announced some pilot activities to be undertaken. This area will be really important in furture EC calls, so it would be useful for you to get a flavour of what the EU’s thinking is, so you can see if you are able to fit in anywhere with it.

The SRA is built around three main areas:

  • determinants of diet and physical activity;
  • diet and food production; and
  • diet-related chronic diseases.

The three pilot actions are as follows:

  • a project on determinants of diet and physical behaviour;
  • a roadmap initiative for biomarkers for nutritional/health claims; and 
  • a European nutrition phenotype data sharing initiative.

You can read more on the JPI website.

Erasmus Student Network (ESN) Survey 2012 “Exchange: Creating Ideas, Opportunities and Identity” now open for responses

The focus of this year’s edition is to investigate the employability of mobile and non-mobile students and show the beneficial effects of going abroad. The survey also explores the impact of student mobility on entrepreneurship and European citizenship, and gives insight into students´ satisfaction with ESN and other student organisations.

The survey will stay open until the 30th of September and takes no more than 15 minutes to fill in. All participants who complete it have the chance to win a two week intensive language course including 32 lessons in the exclusive Education First school in Manchester (with a total value of more than EUR 1,000).

Accommodation in a host family or residence and a meal plan are included as well as the flight and transfer are included.

AHRC European Proposal Support Fund

The European Proposal Support Fund (PSF) provides funding to enable researchers to network with potential partners and support the putting together of a proposal to the European Commission.

The fund is primarily aimed at encouraging UK arts and humanities researchers to engage with the European Commission Socio-economic Sciences and Humanities (SSH) Work Programme, however we are open to considering other European Commission Funding sources. In these cases please contact the AHRC prior to submission and we will advise if you can apply (note: European Research Council (ERC) and Marie Curie Actions are not eligible).

Funding is for up to £10,000 for travel, subsistence, meeting costs etc to enable the researchers involved in the proposal to meet and put together their commission application. Investigator time, overheads etc cannot be included. Applicants must be Arts and Humanities Researchers based in the UK who would ordinarily be eligible for AHRC funding. The application form is very short and needs to be emailed to p.henly@ahrc.ac.uk by the closing date. Deadline: 21st August 2012

 

New Submission System for 2013 FP7 Calls

Just as a reminder to any of you who have submitted previously to the EC, but a new system is being introduced for the 2013 calls. The new system is going to replace the Electronic Proposal Submission System (EPSS). Currently, all open calls under the 2013 Work Programmes apart from the European Research Council (ERC) calls require submission of proposals via the new system. Don’t worry if you are going for this year’s Marie Curie’s however as calls still open under the 2012 Marie Curie Work Programme will use the old EPSS system.

The new system is integrated into the Participant Portal; so you need to make sure you have a European Commission Authenticated Service (ECAS) account (and make sure you do this in plenty of time). There is a user guide for the system on the EC website.
In short, to start a proposal submission, go via the link provided on the specific Call page in the Participant Portal. In the section Electronic Proposal Submission, the call topic is selected from a drop-down menu. Applicants will have to input their ECAS account information in a separate window before they can continue with their application. Once logged into ECAS, applicants are automatically directed to the Participant Portal submission system screen, and then have to complete “Step 3” (with Step 1 being the login and Step 2 the selection of the funding scheme).

In order to progress from Step 3, the Participant Identification Code (PIC) of the co-ordinating institution is absolutely needed. From here, proposal submission is quite similar to the previous EPSS system. It is important to note however, that a PIC code is now needed for every partner in the consortium in order to be able to add their data. There are also a number of technical requirements details of which you can find in the Commission guide.

Once the first registration is completed, you can go back into the system via the Participant Portal. As in EPSS, it is possible to resubmit drafts of proposals until the deadline. Our resident EU submission experts Paul Lynch and Alex Peirce in RKEO are on hand to give you further advice if you need it.

Erasmus for All update

An Erasmus for All event was held last week, hosted by the German Academic Exchange Service and brought together representatives from the European Commission, the European Parliament for presentations and a round table discussion. There is a report on Erasmus for All being drafted and its creator gave the following key points as to what will be in it:

  • The name of the Lifelong Learning Programme (LLP) should be retained as it covers the content of the programme much better and it is known widely in Europe. It is proposed that this and other sub-programme names such as Erasmus, Comenius and Leonardo should also be retained.
  • The three level structure of the Key Actions on mobility, co-operation and policy should be implemented but in addition there should be clearer visibility and fixed budgets for each sector.
  • Rather than the proposed 56% of the budget being allocated for this scheme, at least 90% of the budget should be pre-allocated in the proposal so that institutions can plan longer term how they want to use the programme.

The draft report will be finalised this week which will then be translated and presented in the Culture and Education Committee (CULT) on 19 September and should be voted on in CULT in November. The vote in plenary is currently scheduled for January 2013, but is subject to the Council’s proposal on the EU Budget for the next financing period 2014-2020.

It is also proposed that “Erasmus for All”  will have a new category of transnational partnership called Sector Skills Alliances (SSA) to promote cooperation between three categories of partners: the world of education and training (VET providers); sector-specific expertise (including social partners, sectoral federations, Chambers etc.); and bodies involved in education and training systems (public or private bodies or authorities).  Drawing on evidence of skills needs and trends, SSA will work to design and deliver joint curricula and methods which provide learners with the skills required by the labour market. The overall goal is systemic impact on training in the economic sectors concerned in order to increase their competitiveness. The current call for proposals provides and direct support for testing Sector Skills Alliances to draw lessons for future implementation.

I will keep you posted on further developments.

Current EU tenders open for applications

Europe’s Capacity to Tackle Demographic and Societal Change: The purpose of this call is to support a partnership of not-for-profit research bodies, public institutions and civil society organisations, to focus on collection and dissemination of key facts, figures, trends and policy analysis regarding demographic change across the EU. The ultimate aim of the partnership’s work will be to reach a wide non-specialist audience and to promote a well-informed public debate on its implications and appropriate policy responses among the general public in all Member States and at all levels of government. Deadline 11.09.12

A Profile of Current and Future Audiovisual Consumers: The study should aim at understanding the behaviour, preferences and orientations of audiences for films in general and, in particular, of young audiences. To that end, it should include in-depth interviews with, in particular, 10–15 and 15–25 year olds to learn more about their consumption patterns and their perception of current ways of marketing European films, series, etc.; i.e. could different or earlier marketing change their behaviour? The study should investigate the impact of different marketing tools including the use of social media. Furthermore it should analyse some of the existing film literacy initiatives and their impact on the future consumption patterns. The role of social networks for audiovisual consumption should be analysed. The study should be implemented by experts/consultants, who have in-depth experience with market research. Deadline 13.08.12

Economic Impact of Social Enterprises: The main objective of this call for proposals is to contribute to the availability of reliable statistics on social enterprises at national and European levels and to identify countries interested in collecting this information.  The aim is to provide policy makers and stakeholders with credible, comparable and systematic information and indicators on the role of social enterprises in national economies and to offer usable and practical information to support decision making. The Commission wishes to encourage national statistical offices in Member States to collect this information, so although other organisations dealing with the promotion of social enterprises (including universities and research organisations) are eligible applicants for the call, all proposals must involve national statistical offices. Deadline 07.09.12

Prevention of and Fight Against Crime Programme: Of most interest to BU under this scheme are action grants for transnational and national projects, for which there will be a budget of €78m in 2012. A series of targeted calls for proposals for action grants to support projects concerned with five specific policy areas were recently announced. Each has a deadline for submission of applications in August 2012  In the main, opportunities exist for HEIs to apply for support to undertake studies and analyses in specific areas and to establish networks of expertise. There are also limited opportunities to develop and deliver training courses for law enforcement professionals, prosecutors and judges and to identify and disseminate best practices in relevant fields.

LifeLong Learning Programme- Implementation of the European strategic objectives in Education and Training (ET2020): This call for proposals is for projects to fulfil the objectives for 2012-2014 in two separate parts:-  Part A: Support for raising awareness around and the national implementation of European cooperation in education and training. Part B: Support for the implementation of innovative learning environments using ICT (called ‘creative class-rooms’) in the development and implementation of transversal education and training policy issues linked to the priorities set out in Europe 2020 and ET 2020. Deadline 01.10.12

Pilot project Economy of cultural diversity: In the Communication ‘A Digital Agenda for Europe’ the Commission identified the need to push ahead with the creation, production and distribution of all platforms of digital content. To this end the European Parliament voted a budget line in the 2012 budget for a ‘Pilot project on the economy of cultural diversity’ which ‘would aim to create an open laboratory to test innovative approaches to deal with content for innovation and digital sharing and distribution. It would be therefore a way to explore new business models respecting diversity in the production and distribution chain’.  The aim of this pilot is to highlight and promote 10 to 15 ideas which make innovative use of ICT based technologies to finance, produce, make available, disseminate and/or extract value from cultural contents. Projects should facilitate access to culture (including cultural heritage) and cultural literacy via online devices and promote cultural diversity in the digital environment.

Preparatory Action Culture in external relations: The specific objective of this contract is to formulate recommendations for a strategy on culture in European external relations which will build on synergies with existing processes and will involve a high number of stakeholders in Europe and representatives of third countries, including cultural institutes and NGOs. Deadline 17.08.12

Regional Innovation Monitor 2013-2014 – RIM Plus: The EU’s Regional Innovation Monitor (RIM http://www.rim-europa.eu/) serves over 200 EU regions in 20 different countries. Under this call for tenders the Commission wishes to establish a service that will provide regional administrators with a reference framework for the development of more efficient innovation strategies. An inventory innovation strategies at regional level in Europe will be kept updated and made available to those actors involved in developing policy measures in support of innovation.  The service contract will provide users (regional authorities and stakeholders, Member States’ central administrations, the Committee of the Regions, various services of the Commission, experts, businesses and universities) with an overview of the state of development of regional policies and strategies on innovation and on the difficulties and successes of their implementation in the regions. Deadline 31.08.12

Business Innovation Observatory: The European Commission wishes to tender for a service contract to develop a Business Innovation Observatory. The Business Innovation Observatory is a three-year project with the aim to provide European policy makers with analysis and intelligence on latest novel business and industrial innovation trends, activities and models on a regular basis. The emphasis will be placed on the business micro-perspective and how it relates to the wider institutional, political, socio-economic, legal and policy contexts. The analysis will be complemented by the development of appropriate policy recommendations at European and national levels. The tool should be seen as complementary to quantitative analytical instruments, most notably the Commission’s European Innovation Scoreboards. Deadline 10.09.12

 

Have your say on the future of Intelligent Energy Europe!

The current Intelligent Energy Europe (IEE) programme is coming to an end in 2013, and the European Commission is seeking your views to help shape the next IEE programme. IEE III will run from 2014 to 2020 under the Energy Challenge of the future EU programme for Research and Innovation ´Horizon 2020´. You can express your views by 5 September 2012 by completing a short online questionnaire.

Funding for International Cooperation in the Film Industry (UK)

The European Commission has announced that the call for proposals  for the year 2012 has been launched an EC Film Industry Call for projects taking place between the 1 February 2013 and 30 June 2014, in the fields of training, market access, distribution and circulation of audiovisual works. The European Union adopted a new MEDIA Mundus programme, a broad international cooperation programme for the audiovisual industry to strengthen cultural and commercial relations between Europe’s film industry and film-makers of third countries. The EU will provide €4,426 million of funding for projects submitted by audiovisual professionals from Europe and from third countries.  The closing date for applications is the 28 September 2012.