ESC51 Volunteering Projects: the application, step by step

What it is

Volunteering Projects let an organisation holding a Quality Label for lead organisations request a grant for volunteering activities — individual volunteering and volunteering teams — over up to 24 months. The European Solidarity Corps is a separate EU programme from Erasmus+, with its own Guide; applications go to the National Agency. The application is a short grant request: the objectives come from the Quality Label, and the form asks for the activities requested and any real costs. There are no award criteria: the National Agency allocates the grant under its own published rules.

Who can apply

Organisations holding a valid Quality Label for lead organisation at the grant application deadline.

Quality Label

Obtaining a Quality Label for lead organisations is a precondition for applying. To submit a grant request in the first round of a call year, an organisation must submit its Quality Label for lead application in the previous year, by the date the Guide sets. The Quality Label for lead organisations is open to public or private entities legally established in an EU Member State or a third country associated to the Programme for at least one year, and to international organisations.

Duration

Up to 24 months.

Funding

A grant request, not a budget you calculate: the form generates a budget from your activities using a system of average costs, and the National Agency decides the grant under its own allocation rules, published ahead of the call deadline.

Deadlines

Deadlines are set in each year's call. Check the current deadline with your National Agency.

How many applications

An organisation may apply only once per round.

How it is scored

In this simplified application procedure, the applications do not undergo a qualitative assessment and therefore no award criteria are applied.

The awarded grant amount will depend on a number of elements:

• the total budget available for allocation;
• the requested activities;
• the minimum and maximum grant;
• the score of the Quality Label application for lead organisation;
• applicant’s performance (progress report score, budget absorption and final report score of the last completed Volunteering Project, if available);
• policy priorities and thematic areas addressed by the activities applied for;
• proportion of young people with fewer opportunities involved.

Detailed rules on basic and maximum grant, scoring of the allocation criteria, weighting of each criterion, the allocation method, and the budget available for Volunteering Projects will be published by the National Agency ahead of the call deadline.

The form structure

The official sections, in the order the form presents them.

1. 1.Quality label
   • Retrieved from your OID; the objectives come from it rather than being written
2. 2.Applicant organisations
3. 3.Objectives and activity plan
4. 4.Activities
   • The volunteering activities requested, and any real costs with a short justification each
5. 5.Annexes
6. 6.Application conditions

How you write it in AvenEU

• ✦Basic support only: this is a short grant request (activities, numbers and a few 500-character cost justifications) with no texts that are assessed and no award criteria, so it is not one of the programmes AvenEU's writing help is built for. AvenEU helps with the basics: the form's structure, eligibility, the deadline and how the grant is allocated.