16.4.2018

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 133/25

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CALL FOR PROPOSALS — EACEA/16/2018

Erasmus+ programme, Key Action 3 — Support for Policy Reform

European Youth Together

(2018/C 133/09)

1.   INTRODUCTION — BACKGROUND  (1)

Young people are active in EU mobility activities: they join pan-European organisations or engage in less structured non-formal exchanges with young people from other European countries and they show positive attitudes and support to the European integration process (2). In their capacity, they can be powerful ambassadors of the European project and build bridges across the continent, particularly from East and West Europe but also along the North-South line, to inspire others in the way they experience Europe and their European identity.

Erasmus+ Youth today promotes youth exchanges, youth worker mobility and supports youth organisations. Analysis of experience reveals a fruitful and active cooperation between organisations and young people across countries. The Erasmus+ programme is successful in attracting and engaging young people. There is great interest in participation and currently only 1 in 3 mobility projects (Youth Exchanges, Youth Workers Mobility) and 1 in 5 in partnerships (Transnational Youth Initiatives) can be supported.

As President Juncker pointed out in his 2017 State of the Union speech (3); ‘…Europe must be a Union of equality and a Union of equals. Equality between its Members, big or small, East or West, North or South.’ Young people are key actors in making this happen. They might often be less engaged than older persons in traditional forms of participation such as voting or belonging to a political party, but a majority among them declare interest in politics and have stronger feelings of citizenship towards the EU than older groups. The new Eurobarometer survey (4) on European Youth confirms young people’s interest in more contemporary forms of civic participation: more than half (53 %) of respondents say they have participated in at least one type of organised activity in the last 12 months (+ 4 pp. since 2014), while nearly a third (31 %) of young people in the EU indicate that they have participated in organised voluntary activities in the past 12 months (+ 6 pp. since 2014).

According to the survey, young people ask the EU to prioritise subjects such as education and skills, protection of environment, migration issues and EU citizenship. These findings are well in line with the outcomes of the New Narrative for Europe. The New Narrative for Europe was a 5-year project that aimed to gather the views of young people on what the future priorities of the EU with regard to young people should be. The project was concluded in 31 January 2018, where a group of young people handed the outcomes of this project over to Commission (5).

2.   OBJECTIVES

The scope of the ‘European Youth Together’ actions should build on the experience obtained through the ‘New Narrative for Europe’ (6) project and other youth policy and programme initiatives aiming to promote young people’s participation in European public life as well as cross-border exchanges and mobility activities.

2.1.   General Objectives

‘European Youth Together’ projects aim to create networks promoting regional partnerships, and to be run in close cooperation with young people from across Europe (Erasmus+ programme countries). The networks would organise exchanges, promote training (for instance for youth leaders), and allow young people themselves to set up joint projects.

‘European Youth Together’ will support initiatives from at least five youth organisations from five different eligible Erasmus+ programme countries to share their ideas about the EU, encourage wider civic participation and help foster a sense of European citizenship. The initiative will aim to bring together European youth from across Europe; East, West, North and South.

The thematic priorities are active citizenship, network-building, European values and European citizenship, democratic participation, democratic resilience and social inclusion related to youth.

2.2.   Specific Objectives

The initiative will specifically support:

—	promotion and development of more structured cooperation between different youth organisations to build or strengthen partnerships;

—

youth organisations involved in initiatives to encourage young people to participate in the democratic process and in society by organising trainings, showcase commonalities among young Europeans and encourage discussion and debate on their connection to the EU, its values and democratic foundations. This includes organising events as a lead-up to the 2019 elections to the European Parliament;

—	promote participation of under-represented groups of young people in politics, youth organisations and other civil society organisations by engaging vulnerable and socioeconomic disadvantaged youth.

It targets youth NGOs, public bodies and informal groups of young people which would propose projects involving at least five partners who have the capacity to mobilise young people in partnerships covering different countries and regions within the Erasmus+ programme countries.

3.   ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA

Applications which comply with the following criteria will be subject to an in-depth evaluation.

Only applications from legal entities established in the Erasmus+ programme countries are eligible (7).

3.1.   Eligible applicants

Participating organisations can be:

—	non-profit organisations, associations and NGOs including European Youth NGOs;

—	social enterprises;

—	public bodies at local-, regional- or national level;

—	associations of regions;

—	European Groupings of Territorial Cooperation;

—	profit-making bodies active in Corporate Social Responsibility

established in an Erasmus+ programme country.

The minimum partnership composition requirement for this call is at least 5 partners from 5 different countries eligible for participation in the Erasmus+ programme. Applying organisations should demonstrate their capacity to ensure a good geographical balance in terms of partners from different parts of the Erasmus+ programme countries. This means a partnership distribution across eligible countries where partners come from different regions East, West, North and South.

3.2.   Eligible countries

—	EU Member States: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom;

—	The European Free Trade Association (EFTA) countries, which form part of the European Economic Area (EEA): Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway;

—

Candidate countries for which a pre-accession strategy has been established, in accordance with the general principles and general terms and conditions laid down in the framework agreements concluded with those countries with a view to their participation in EU programmes: former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Turkey.

3.3.   Eligible activities

European Union financing under this Call takes the form of an action grant to support part of the costs incurred by the selected bodies in carrying out a series of activities. These activities must be directly linked to the general and specific objectives of the Call and must be detailed in a project description covering the whole period of the grant applied for.

The following types of activities are eligible:

—	Mobility activities including large scale youth exchanges;

—	Activities facilitating access and participation of youth in the EU policy agenda;

—	Exchanges of experience and good practice; networking and partnerships with other youth organisations; participation in meetings or seminars with other stakeholders and/or policy-makers also with a view to increasing policy impact on target groups, sectors and/or systems;

—	Initiatives and events for developing European NGO/Civil Society organisations/EU-wide networks;

—	Awareness-raising, information, dissemination and promotion activities (seminars, workshops, campaigns, meetings, public debates, consultations, etc.) on EU policy priorities in the field of youth;

Activities shall be of cross-border nature and may be performed at European, national, regional or local level.

Additional eligibility criteria for mobility activities/youth exchanges:

—	duration: from 5 to 21 days, excluding travel time;

—	venue(s) of the activity: the activities must take place in the countries of the applicant/partners;

—	eligible participants: young people aged between 13 and 30 who are residents in the countries of the receiving and/or sending organisations;

—

number of participants: minimum 16 and maximum 180 participants (group leader(s) not included). Minimum 4 participants per group (group leader(s) not included). Each national group must have at least one group leader. A group leader is an adult who accompanies the young people participating in a mobility activity/youth exchange in order to ensure their effective learning, protection and safety.

4.   PROJECT RESULTS AND DURATION

The granted projects should demonstrate their expected contribution to the overall EU youth policy agenda by:

—	building on the outcomes of the New Narrative for Europe (or other similar debate projects) and linking them to policy development at local/regional/national/European level;

—	improving the involvement of young people in democratic life and their engagement with decision makers (empowerment, new skills, involvement of young people in project design, etc.);

—	helping to improve the capacity of the youth sector to work transnationally and promoting transnational learning and cooperation between young people and decision makers;

—	upscaling existing best practices and outreach beyond the regular network(s);

—	disseminating their results in an effective and attractive way among young people involved in youth organisations, so as to pave the way for more systematic partnerships, and also among youngsters who are not affiliated to youth structures or those who come from disadvantaged backgrounds.

The project duration must be between 9 and 24 months. It cannot be extended in time.

5.   AWARD CRITERIA

The eligible applications will be assessed on the basis of exclusion, selection, and award criteria. The exclusion and selection criteria can be found in the application guidelines located at: https://eacea.ec.europa.eu/erasmus-plus/funding_en

The award criteria for the funding of an application are:

—	Relevance of the project (25 %)

—	Quality of the project design and implementation (25 %)

—	Quality of the partnership and cooperation arrangements (25 %) Including how young people are involved in all stages of the project implementation and how the East-West and North-South lines are taken into account.

—	Impact, dissemination and sustainability (25 %)

Only proposals having reached:

—	at least the threshold of 60 % of the total score (i.e. aggregate score of the 4 award criteria) and

—	at least the threshold of 50 % of each criterion

will be considered for EU funding.

6.   BUDGET

The total budget available for the co-financing of projects under the present call is EUR 5 000 000.

The financial contribution from the EU is minimum EUR 100 000 and cannot exceed EUR 500 000. It is limited to a maximum co-financing rate of 80 % of the total eligible project costs.

The Agency reserves the right not to distribute all the funds available.

7.   SUBMISSION PROCEDURE AND DEADLINE

The application package must be submitted online using the correct e-form, duly completed and containing all relevant and applicable annexes and supporting documents.

The eForm is available in English, French and German at the following internet address:

http://eacea.ec.europa.eu/erasmus-plus/funding_en

and must be duly completed in one of the official languages of the EU.

The e-Form duly completed must be submitted online by 25 May 2018 — 12.00 (midday, Brussels time) and include the relevant annexes (8):

Additional compulsory administrative annexes must be sent by email to the Agency by the same deadline.

Applicants are requested to read carefully all information about the call for proposals EACEA/16/2018 and the submission procedure and to use the documents forming part of the application package which can be found under:

https://eacea.ec.europa.eu/erasmus-plus/funding_en

8.   ALL CALL INFORMATION

All information on the Call EACEA/16/2018 including the application guidelines is available from the following website:

https://eacea.ec.europa.eu/erasmus-plus/funding_en

Email contact:

EACEA-YOUTH@ec.europa.eu

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(1)  See C(2018)774 of 15/2/2018 (WPI 3.18): https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/erasmus-plus/sites/erasmusplus2/files/c-2018-774-en.pdf

(2)  See ‘European Youth’ Eurobarometer 455 (September 2017), published January 2018: http://ec.europa.eu/commfrontoffice/publicopinion/index.cfm/survey/getsurveydetail/instruments/flash/surveyky/2163.

(3)  http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_SPEECH-17-3165_en.htm

(4)  https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/erasmus-plus/sites/erasmusplus2/files/c-2018-774-en.pdf

(5)  https://europa.eu/youth/have-your-say/new-narrative-for-europe_en

(6)  See https://europa.eu/youth/have-your-say/new-narrative-for-europe_en

(7)  http://ec.europa.eu/programmes/erasmus-plus/sites/erasmusplus2/files/files/resources/erasmus-plus-programme-guide_en.pdf.

(8)  Any other administrative document required in the Applicant Guidelines must be sent by email to the Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency by latest 25 May 2018 (midday, Brussels time) at the following email address: EACEA-YOUTH@ec.europa.eu

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