The Erasmus Mundus Action Two Partnership programme is a cooperation and mobility scheme in the area of higher education launched by Europe Aid Cooperation Office and implemented by the Executive Agency Education, Audiovisual and Culture (EACEA). The European Commissionhas launched this initiative to foster cooperation between higher education institutions. It aims to boost exchanges of students, researchers and academic staff and to support mobility, in particular from non-EU countries to EU member states.

The EMA2 objective is to achieve better understanding and mutual enrichment between the European Union and Third Countries in the field of higher education through promoting the exchange of persons, knowledge and skills at higher education level. This will be achieved through the promotion of partnerships and institutional co-operation exchanges between European Higher Education Institutions and Third Country institutions and a mobility scheme addressing student and academic exchanges.

Objectives

• To promote cooperation between the EU and the Asian countries involved in the project: the project is striving to gradually reinforce the structured long-term cooperation between all partners and to strengthen the relations that were established amongst the partners in the on-going Lotus I and Lotus II project. This should in the end result in a sustainable and strong network. The project continues to offer the perfect opportunity to boost the exchange of know-how for curriculum development, new teaching methods, international relations and university management.
• To enable students to benefit from a study/research period abroad and thus develop a pool from well-qualified, open-minded and internationally experienced young women/men as future leaders. The project aims to bring young people from European and Asian countries closer together by offering opportunities to grantees from the Asia Regional to come to the EU and build up long-lasting relations through their study/research experience in the relevant host country.
• To promote the regional cooperation in the Asian countries involved by encouraging the strong and experienced partners to guide and share their Best Practice with the lesser experienced partner institutions in the project. Thus training a future generation of academics that fosters a culture of sustainable development and durable growth, and promotes regional integration. The goal is to further nourish the mutual understanding between the countries in that region.
• To continue striving for and improving the transparency and recognition of studies and qualifications: the project is focused on mobility and will give explicit attention to the promotion of recognition of studies systems, the (further) implementation of ECTS and Diploma Supplement.
• To contribute to give students from vulnerable groups equal chances and thus disseminating EU social and democratic values: 11% of the scholarships is reserved for students from vulnerable and/or disadvantaged groups in the Asian countries involved (refugees, ethnic minorities, internally displaced populations, disabled students, economically disadvantaged students). Lotus I and Lotus II have proven it to be very difficult to reach possible candidates from these specific groups, so the project aims to continue contacting more active NGO’s and institutions in the region in order to promote the project to this specific target group.
• To further enhance the skills of staff, who can in their turn contribute to the improvement of the educational system in their home country: 22.73% of the scholarships are reserved for staff exchange. Academic and administrative staff members applying will have to argument how their mobility period abroad will contribute to structural reforms in their relevant home institution in Asia. Experience from the Lotus I and Lotus II project has shown that academic and administrative staff consider it an opportunity to gain a new experience, which can be implemented in their own work environment upon their return in their home country.
• To further pursue enhancing the political, cultural, educational and economic links between the EU and the Asian countries involved in the medium term: this project further plans to improve mutual understanding between the EU and Asia, by continuing to take up the challenge of including not only the obviously stronger countries in Asia but also including more sensitive ones, that are striving to overcome their own political and socio-economic past. The project will carry on planning promotional tours in Myanmar and Cambodia in order to strengthen the relationship with the relevant local authorities and thus gradually changing the overall attitude towards these countries.

Fields of Study
Based on the specific countries needs, the following list of thematic fields of study has been prioritized by this project:

01: Agricultural Sciences
02: Architecture, Urban and Regional Planning
04: Business Studies and Management Sciences
05: Education, Teacher Training
06: Engineering, Technology
07: Geography, Geology
10: Law
12: Medical Sciences
13: Natural Sciences
14: Social Science
16: Other Areas of Study

Students from other fields of study can however still apply for a scholarship. In case of equally ranked applications, priority will be given to the student majoring in a prioritized field of study.

Scholarships
The scholarship covers the following aspect:

• Monthly subsistence allowance
• Travel ticket
• Insurance
• Participation cost

More specifically:
Subsistence allowance:

• 1000 € per month for undergraduate and graduate students
• 1500 € per month for doctorate students
• 1800 € per month for post-doctorates
• 2500 € per month for academic staff

Insurance costs:

• All grant holders are insured by a central Group Insurance. In order to arrange your insurance, you should fill out your travel dates on the Grant Holder Pages. Based upon these dates, the Lotus Secretariat will apply for insurance for the period that you are abroad. You will receive the insurance card by email - you should use this for the embassy.
• The claim form for luggage and for medical expenses with contact details can be downloaded here. Please make sure to report claims within 7 days as stated in the policy.

Participation costs:

• The tuition fees are covered by the project.

Travel costs:

• One return ticket will be provided by the coordinator by means of booking via a central travel agency. Self-purchased tickets will not be reimbursed.
• Travel Costs: depending on the distance.

Partners
The Lotus project is sustained by a consortium consisting of 20 partner universities: 9 universities from the EU and 11 universities from the South-East Asion Region:

EU Universities:

• Ghent University (Belgium)
• Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium)
• University of Goettingen (Germany)
• Sciences Po (France)
• Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier University (France)
• Rijksuniversiteit Groningen (The Netherlands)
• University of Porto (Portugal)
• Uppsala University (Sweden)
• University of Kent (UK)

South-East Asian Universities

• University of Health Sciences Phnom Penh (Cambodia)
• Nanjing University (China)
• Peking University (China)
• Sichuan University (China)
• Bandung Institute of Technology (Indonesia)
• University of Gadjah Mada (Indonesia)
• West Yangon Technological University (Myanmar)
• Thamassat University (Thailand)
• Can Tho University (Vietnam)
• Hanoi University of Science and Technology (Vietnam)
• Hue University (Vietnam)

Associated members: there are multiple associate partners involved in Lotus III:

• Universitas Airlangga (Indonesia)
• EIAS – European Institute for Asian Studies (Belgium)
• Kasetsart University (Thailand)
• Morning Tears (China)
• Province East-Flanders (Belgium)
• Royal University of Agriculture (Cambodia)
• Support Fund Myanmar (Belgium)
• Tuning (Spain)
• University of Sumatra Utara (Indonesia)
• VLIR-UOS (Belgium)
• Yezin Agricultural University (Myanmar)
• University of Veterinary Science (Myanmar)

The project is managed by a Project Coordination Team, which consists of staff members of all partner universities’ International Relations Offices. In every university there is a Local Management Team with representatives of the university management, of the International Relations Office and of the academic staff members. They will coordinate the project within their own university, and they report to the Project Coordination Team at Ghent University.

Eligibility criteria for students
Please bear in mind that the scholarships are only granted to South-East Asian students and staff coming to Europe. Asian students who want to participate in mobility to the EU:

• Must be a national of one of the third countries covered by the relevant lot;
• Must have not resided nor have carried out their main activity (studies, work, etc) for more than a total of 12 months over the last five years in one of the European countries;
• For Target Group 1 (TGI): students need to be registered at one of the third-country HEIs within the partnership at the time of submitting their application to the partnership. Undergraduate students must have successfully completed at least one year of studies in their home institution;
• For Target Group 2 (TGII): students need either to be registered in a HEI (not included in the partnership) of the third-country concerned by the lot or to have obtained a university degree or equivalent from a HEI of these third-countries;
• For Target Group 3 (TGIII): students need to be nationals of one of the third-countries concerned by the lot and be part of the vulnerable target groups;
• Must have sufficient knowledge of the language of the courses or of one of the languages currently spoken in the hosting countries.
• No student can benefit from more than one mobility activity in the same project.

Eligibility criteria for staff
In order to be eligible, academic and administrative staff hereafter referred as “staff”:

• Must be a national of one of the eligible countries;
• For Target Group 1 (TGI): Third- country staff must work in or be associated to one of the third-country Higher Education Institutions (=HEI) participating in the partnership. EU staff must work in or be associated to one of the EU HEIs participating in the partnership;
• For Target Group 2 (TGII): Third-country staff must work in or be associated to a HEI (not included in the partnership) of any third-country concerned by the lot. EU staff must work in or be associated to a HEI (not included in the partnership) of any European country.
• The mobility assignments must be based on partnership agreements between the members of the partnership;
• The home and host universities and the individual staff must agree on the programme of lectures to be delivered by the visiting staff, on the research activities or on the type of training to be followed;
• The mobility may constitute a post-per-post exchange or a one-way visitor flow to or from a third country.
• Priority will be given to mobility that:
  • Ensures that the visiting teacher’s contribution will be an integral part of a program of the host institution
  • Will lead to the production of new teaching material
  • Will be used to consolidate and extend links between departments and faculties and to prepare for future cooperation projects between the home and host university (joint projects, joint degrees etc.)
  • Will help strengthen the international cooperation departments in the foreign universities
  • Will lead to progress in the application of ECTS (European Credit Transfer System) and other systems for recognition of studies and qualifications in the partner institution
  • Will improve the university - enterprise cooperation
  • Will help to start up Doctoral Schools
  • Will lead to the improvement of quality assurance mechanisms at universities.

The Lotus III Project provides the following types of scholarships:

• Scholarships for bachelor students (6 months exchange mobility)
• Scholarships for master students (ranging from 6 to 22 months depending on the country of the applicant concerned)
• Scholarships for PhD students (ranging from 6 to 36 months depending on the country of the applicant concerned). PhD’ers applying for a 36 month scholarship should be aware of the fact that they should start their mobility before the end of June 2013.
• Scholarships for Post-Doc students ( 6 months exchange mobility)
• Scholarships for academic and administrative staff ( limited to 1 month)

The application form is for Asian postdoctoral applicants only, who are a national from one of the countries belonging to the Lotus consortium or having obtained a PhD-degree at an HEI in China, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, Myanmar or Cambodia.