With this project, we wanted to first raise stakeholders’ attention to the limitations of the current grant system, broadly unchanged for the past decades, and the need to tackle the main issue with student mobility (financial concerns). We aimed to gather and systematise updated insights on key stakeholders' constraints and perspectives to then explore potential and better alternatives to the current system. This was our second main goal: to develop and test a new grant calculation methodology, which could allow the participation of any Higher Education (HE ) student in the mobility programme and provide a more adequate answer to their effective needs. A new methodology that would also: a) allow students to choose their destinations based on relevant academic-based criteria, and not on financial ones; b) simplify communication and allow students to understand better the grant amounts they receive; c) allow available EU funds to be used more efficiently, thus meeting the actual financial needs of the students during their mobility. Finally, we wanted to convey specific recommendations to the national and EU-level policymakers in view of defining the next Erasmus+ 2028-2034 programme and making access to mobility more equitable.
Erasmus+ is a flagship initiative of the European Union, having reached 13,7 million participants in mobility activities by 2022. The benefits of such an experience are undeniable, ultimately contributing to a sense of European identity. Since 2021, inclusion has been identified as a key priority of the programme, and since then it has introduced measures to foster student mobility and make the experience more inclusive to all participants. However, extant research indicates that financial obstacles are among the primary deterrents for students from participating in mobility. Today, to participate in Erasmus+, students must rely on additional financial support (such as family). Students who cannot do it, often cannot partake in the programme , which means that Erasmus is still an elitist programme. Furthermore, the current system determining the grant amount to be awarded to students leads to considerable inequalities even for students in the same situation (e.g. destination country), as it ignores actual living costs and uses a coarse approach. In times when Higher Education Institutions face ambitious goals on student mobility, a change is needed to foster it and make Erasmus truly for all, regardless of students’ backgrounds