Would you like your students to collaborate with peers from across Europe, explore different perspectives and develop intercultural skills?
The UNIC Virtual and International Projects (VIP) Fund supports EUR educators who want to introduce or further develop international collaboration within their teaching. You can use the fund to add an international component to a course you already teach or to develop a new activity or course.
No UNIC teaching partner yet? That’s not a problem. The EUR UNIC team can help you connect with educators at other UNIC universities who share your teaching interests.
What is Virtual Exchange
Virtual Exchange brings together students and educators from different universities to learn and collaborate across borders online. Students might work together on a shared assignment, project or challenge, take part in joint learning activities, or exchange perspectives and ideas as part of their courses.
The emphasis is on active collaboration between students, rather than simply attending the same online lecture.
Want to learn more? The UNIC Mobility Handbook provides step-by-step guidance on developing Virtual Exchange, including practical examples, from page 33 onwards.
Curious what Virtual Exchange can look like in practice? Get inspired by educators across UNIC who have brought international collaboration into their courses and see how their students learn and work together across borders. See Virtual Exchange in action.
Who can apply?
The VIP Fund is open to all EUR staff involved in teaching, including professors, lecturers and other educators.
Simply having students attend the same online lecture is not sufficient. Interaction and collaboration between students should be an integral part of the learning activity.
Projects can establish a new international teaching collaboration or expand, deepen or transfer an existing one.
What funding is available?
EUR offers grants of up to €5,000 per project to support the development and implementation of the educational activity.
The funding is allocated to the participating EUR faculty and can only cover costs incurred by EUR faculties and/or EUR staff. Costs incurred by colleagues at other UNIC universities cannot be covered by the EUR grant. Partner educators may be able to access comparable support through their own institution.
How to apply
Applications are accepted on a rolling basis, so you can apply whenever your proposal is ready. You will receive a decision within four weeks of submitting your application.
To apply:
- Download and complete the application form (below).
- Check the Call for Proposals for the full criteria and conditions.
- Send your completed application form to unic@eur.nl.
Application form
Project timeline
Your project and all related expenditure must be completed by 31 July 2027.
Have an idea but not sure where to start? Contact the EUR UNIC team to discuss your idea or get help finding a UNIC teaching partner.
Contact
UNIC-Team EUR
- Email address
- unic@eur.nl
- Social Media
About UNIC
UNIC is a European Universities alliance that connects ten European universities in cities facing post-industrial transition. The partners collaborate on shared teaching and learning innovation, student and staff mobility, city engagement, and more.
UNIC supports virtual international educational activities among its ten partner universities. It considers virtual international collaboration an innovative mobility format that complements traditional student exchange programmes. Virtual international educational activities contribute to Internationalisation at Home strategies and can effectively internationalise the curriculum.