Call for Labs Student Projects

Through this call, the Alliance wishes to support projects involving students from at least two FORTHEM partner universities and at least one external partner (NGO, company, school, etc.) or an end user at one of the nine universities. Each project will be able to benefit from funding up to €5000.

The labs are not physical entities, but a collaborative network of people who work together on a project or activity.

The contents of the projects can vary. Students have previously arranged webinars on current topics, student-focused events, voluntary work and charitable projects, mini-conferences for aspiring researchers, etc. Project proposals that involve multiple Labs are possible and even highly encouraged.

Students can meet and collaborate with people from different parts of Europe by coming up with a project idea, creating a project plan and budget, and then submitting their ideas to the FORTHEM Labs.

Should you wish for further information, please send us an email.

Who can apply?

Regardless of their academic level, students pursuing Bachelor’s, Master’s, and PhD degrees are all eligible to participate in FORTHEM Labs activities or propose their own initiatives. Students can apply to all Labs; it doesn’t have to be the Lab at their university.

Duration

• It can last from 2 weeks to one semester.
• This call is open for any project executed and reported by the end of October 2024; it will be renewed twice a year, and you may ask for further funding of your project in the next call.
• Application will be reviewed within 4–5 weeks after the end of the call.
• Application deadline: February 29, 2024 (Experiencing Europe Lab; for more deadlines click here)

Criteria

• The projects will address a societal problem and will work through co-creation.
• At least two FORTHEM universities, one external stakeholder or a group of internal end users must collaborate on the whole or part of the project.
• Student commits to at least one form of alliance-level communication or dissemination operation regarding the project, e.g., a blog post, a social media post, a video or other.
• Communication of the results and output and a brief report need to be presented upon completion of the project.

Application

• Only one application per project needs to be submitted.
• Students’ applications will be evaluated by a review board.
• After the approval of the project, the applicants might be asked to adjust the budget.

Apply here

Academic recognition

Depending on your university, your project could grant you ECTS and/or a FORTHEM certificate of accomplishment.

Funding

• Each project can receive up to €5000.
• The funding of the project can be multiplied if more than one Lab is involved in your project.
• Further funding of your project can be requested in the next call.
• A request for funding of travel costs can be made outside this call to your local FORTHEM office.
• Eligible costs: staff costs, dissemination of knowledge and information, travel costs and individual support for student meetings…
• Funds will not be paid directly to the students, so contracts or bills from suppliers must be approved in advance by FORTHEM local teams based on the budget, eligible costs and legal procedures. Please ensure you justify the use of funding in the application form.

Eligible costs

1. Staff costs

• Costs of staff assigned to the action (both permanent and temporary) from the participating institutions/organizations, comprising actual salaries plus social security charges and other statutory costs included in their remuneration. (i.e. interns)
• The grant must be used to cover the costs of staff for all beneficiaries, when they are performing any tasks which are directly related to the achievement of the objectives of the European University.

2. Travel costs

• Contribution to the travel costs of participants to the venue of the activity, return.
• Applicable for staff, students and doctoral candidates from the partner universities taking part in the project (e.g. for training and study activities, meetings, workshops and seminars).

3. Individual support

• Costs directly linked to the subsistence and accommodation of participants taking part in the project during the activity.
• Applicable for staff, students and doctoral candidates from the participating universities (e.g. for training and study activities, meetings, workshops and seminars).

4. Other costs linked to

• Transfer of best practices to higher education institutions outside the alliance
• Dissemination of knowledge and information (e.g. advertising in the media, promotional materials and activities)
• Renting of premises for major events
• Subcontracting for specific tasks. Subcontracting is possible only in justified cases for specific, time-bound, project-related tasks, when these cannot be performed by the consortium members themselves or where the nature of the activity specifically requires external services. Subcontracting of core project activities such as teaching and/or project management (general management and coordination, monitoring, financial management, reporting to EACEA) is not possible. Staff members of co-beneficiaries are not allowed to operate in a subcontracting capacity.
• Travel and/or subsistence costs of third parties (experts, professors, speakers etc.) contributing to the European University’s activities. Travel and subsistence costs for people not belonging to one of the partner universities can be co-funded when these persons are invited by the consortium to take part in the core activities of the European University.