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4EU+ European University Alliance4EU+ Drives forward Development of Innovative Teaching and Learning Formats

Press Release No. 76/2020
9 September 2020

31 projects with mobility components and intercultural approaches selected for funding

In the field of student affairs and teaching, the 4EU+ European University Alliance is driving forward the development of innovative teaching and learning formats for students and doctoral candidates. For this purpose, the alliance – made up of six strong research universities in Europe, including Heidelberg University – has evaluated projects developed by the partners in a multi-stage procedure and selected 31 of them for funding. They involve, in particular, mobility components, whether physical or virtual. Heidelberg University is the coordinating institution for six of the funded projects, in the fields of translation studies and foreign language philology, linguistics with an interdisciplinary approach, psycholinguistics and multilingualism, mathematics and computer science for applications, environmental economics, and interdisciplinary environmental research.

In the context of the call, funds are available for teaching and learning projects involving at least three of the six 4EU+ partner universities. The projects are research-oriented and include both interdisciplinary and intercultural approaches. The present selection comprises face-to-face and online courses, summer schools and micro-degree programmes as well as the development of joint study programmes. In terms of content, they focus on the engagement with global challenges. Each of them is assigned to one of the four central areas of the alliance’s work. These flagships cover health and demographic change in an urban environment, Europe in a changing world, transforming science and society by advancing new information and communication technologies, and issues of biodiversity and sustainable development.

The 4EU+ alliance comprises the universities of Prague, Heidelberg, Sorbonne/Paris, Warsaw, Copenhagen and Milan. Since June 2019 the network of the six partner universities has belonged to the first group of 17 university alliances funded in the context of the Erasmus+ pilot call for European Universities. The alliances receive financial support in order to take initial steps towards long-term, transnational cooperation. By supporting strategic university partnerships and building up an integrated university system, the European Commission pursues the goal of clustering research, teaching and innovation in Europe into new structures, thereby modernising and consolidating the European education area.