The Guild provides recommendations for Investment Pathway of European University alliances

The Guild of European Research-intensive Universities has published a statement with recommendations for the envisaged Investment Pathway of European Universities alliances. The statement was released on 12 February 2024.

The European Universities initiative has put universities into the policy spotlight with a promise of linking education, research, and innovation across national boundaries. In the past year the discussion has focused on ensuring the transformative nature of alliances with appropriate funding (‘Investment Pathway’). The Guild members recognise the need to provide comprehensive support to alliances. More long-term funding coupled with greater flexibility is needed. However, the association argues, European funding alone will never be enough, the sustainability of the initiative will require concerted efforts of national governments and institutional commitments.

The Guild therefore proposes instead of dedicating specific budget to European Universities, to focus on designing calls that reflect the sector's needs, with more budget flexibiligy to support different types of activities.

To contribute to the current discussions on the future funding of the alliances, The Guild recommends:

1. Any future funding should build on the following principles: Quality and excellence; Distinctive character and institutional autonomy; European added value; Scalability; Global dimension of the initiative.
2. The Investment Pathway should reinforce the research and innovation capacity of universities through competition open to all research actors with the necessary expertise to spur changes in their national and/or institutional context. Consortia should demonstrate commitment to implementing policies that can advance the European Research Area (ERA) and contribute to removing silos between education, research and innovation.
3. The Investment Pathway should focus on finding complementarities between the different EU instruments (Erasmus+, Framework Programme, EU’s external action funds, EU’s structural funds) without compromising their key principles. It should also provide more flexibility and bottom-up opportunities to ensure that the content of collaboration is led by the alliances.

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The Guild’s recommendations for the Investment Pathway of European Universities alliances