Thanks to the UK’s Turing Scheme, this year more than 38,000 young people have had a chance to develop new skills and gain international experience in over 160 destinations across continents, from Australia to Zimbabwe. More than half of these placements are for young people from disadvantaged and underrepresented backgrounds, helping to drive social mobility in parts of the UK where historically there have been fewer opportunities to work and study abroad.
The Turing Scheme 2024
Thousands of young people across the UK will also be able to go on international study and work placements next year, as schools, colleges and universities are encouraged to apply to the UK government’s world-wide international work placement scheme. Applications for the third year of the UK’s replacement to the EU’s Erasmus+ programme are now open with outstanding placements available across the globe, starting from September 2023.
Mobility Tips
Mobilities School Projects should include one or both of these:
Short-term placements range from just three days up to two months. Participants can travel with their teachers and work with other participants from a school in another country/territory. Participants usually spend most of that time in the classroom working directly with their partners on mobilities that support their learning and development (for example soft skills, language skills, academic attainment etc.), relevant to the school’s priorities and the aims of their Erasmus+ project. Funding is permitted for accompanying staff to meet safeguarding requirements.
Long-term placements range from two to six months (and are available for participants aged 14 years and older). Participants over the age of 14 can carry out a longer-term placement at a partner school in another country/territory, attending lessons and living with a host family. The sending and hosting schools are expected to ensure high quality learning outcomes and recognition and support during their time abroad. This includes funding for accompanying staff to chaperone participants where necessary, as part of safeguarding and duty of care.
Project Plan Tips
The Project Plan is a projection of planned mobilities that start during each month and collated into Mobility Groups that have the same type of mobility and destination country across the lifecycle of a Turing Scheme Project.
These Mobility Groups are created as part of the application and must be included in the Grant Agreement. The grant recipients report against these in their Project Plan once their project commences. It is therefore important for applicants to accurately plan when their mobility activity will take place and, where possible, work closely with the host partner organisation(s) while preparing their application.
The Project Plan also sets out the Mobility Groups in each month, their start date and the month when payment will be made. The Project Plan must be reviewed in the month of the project’s first undertaken mobilities and updated monthly through the Project Reporting Tool. This is a condition of the Grant Funding Agreement. Grant recipients are required to keep their Project Plan as up to date as possible, over the lifetime of their Project via the Project Reporting Tool. This includes mobility groups that have already started and mobility groups that are yet to begin. In advance of payment, successful applicants will need to submit data on the participants (including their names) via the Project Reporting Tool. This is for verification that funding is being provided for a confirmed mobility.
We hope the above information has proved useful to you when preparing your Turing Scheme mobilities. For further information, don’t hesitate to get in touch with us here.