The Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA) of the European Commission launched on 23 August the new round of the General Call for applications under the Lifelong Learning Programme (LLP), speeding-up the typical application timeline. The call applies to projects that will be funded in 2012, and was made public 2 months earlier compared to last year.

LLP has four sub-programmes that finance projects at different levels of education and training: Comenius (for school education); the well-known Erasmus (for higher education); Leonardo da Vinci (for vocational education and training); and Grundtvig (for adult education). In addition, the programme includes Jean Monnet actions. These stimulate teaching, reflection and debate on European integration. They involve higher education institutions world-wide, and a number of transversal actions relevant for more than one level of education (from language learning, to ICT, policy cooperation and dissemination and exploitation of projects’ results). The latter are funded via the transversal part of the programme.

The strategic priorities of the call in the field of higher education remain unchanged from last year: 

• cooperation between higher education institutions (HEI) and enterprises; 
• social inclusion in higher education; 
• mobility strategies and removal of barriers to mobility in higher education; 
• support to the modernisation agenda of higher education (including curriculum reform, governance reform and funding reform); and 
• fostering excellence and innovation in higher education.

As for innovations, compared to last year: 

• new actions have been included. Under Key Activity 1 of the Transversal Programme there is now the possibility of applying for Roma Multilateral Projects and Roma Networks. 
• and the call now states that the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia may become eligible to participate as "full LLP partners", provided that the formal steps for participation for each country are completed in due time.

The application forms will be available from 30 September. More information is available on the EACEA website.

Total budget: EUR 1.14 billion
Deadline: action specific EACEA