Erasmus+ for internships

Funding is available for internships abroad of between 60 and 360 days, regardless of whether they are compulsory or voluntary.

As soon as an internship position is available and the faculty agrees to the internship, a scholarship can be applied for at the International Office.

In principle, all students completing a full degree with a recognized qualification at Fachhochschule Dortmund can be funded within the framework of Erasmus+.

The internship can be completed during the course of study, but also within one year after graduation (so-called graduate internship).

Important:

• Students must be enrolled at Fachhochschule Dortmund at the time of applying for an Erasmus+ scholarship.
  Students who complete their internship after their studies must also still be enrolled at the time of application; however, they must already be exmatriculated during the internship.
• Students must have already found an internship position at the time of their application for an Erasmus+ scholarship and have a firm commitment.
• Students must not have exhausted their maximum Erasmus+ funding during the respective study period.
• Students whose monthly remuneration during their internship exceeds € 1,000 are unfortunately not eligible to apply for an Erasmus+ internship grant.
• It is not possible to receive funding for internships completed in EU institutions, diplomatic missions of the home country and organizations managing EU programmes.
• There is no age limit.
• Erasmus+ funding can be granted to all students regardless of their citizenship.
• Your internship must be a full-time internship with normal working hours in your country.
• Sufficient health, accident and liability insurance cover must be available at the workplace.

The acceptance of a grant depends primarily on the number and order in which the grant applications are received and the number of grants available.

Additional selection criteria:
Due to the high demand and in order to provide funding to as many students as possible who receive little or no internship pay, we ask interns with internship pay of €1,000 and above to refrain from applying for funding.

Subject to change without notice

1) Find out from your faculty

Before submitting your application, you should find out from your faculty who is responsible for recognizing your Erasmus+ internship.

2) Look for an internship position

Once you know the conditions for recognition, you can look for an internship. Traineeship funding will not be granted if the traineeship is to be completed in one of the following institutions:

• Institutions and organizations of the European Union (EU)
• Institutions and organizations that manage EU programmes
• National and diplomatic representations of your home country

You can get help with your job search and other useful information from the internship office in your faculty.

3) Online application via Mobility Online

The application for ERASMUS+ is only possible online. Register in the portal and complete the application form in the online portal(Opens in a new tab) .

4) Create a Learning Agreement for Traineeship

1. Print out the Learning Agreement from the portal and complete the Learning Agreement for Traineeship.
   Fill in Table A. In particular, the description of your activities must be detailed here - complete on an extra sheet if necessary - and send the document to your internship placement.
   The internship position will provide additional information in Table A and fill out Table C, sign it and send it back to you.
2. You submit the completed internship agreement signed by your future internship placement to the internship coordinator, international coordinator or internship office (responsible person) in the faculty and have Table B completed and the document signed.
3. You sign the Learning Agreement yourself.
4. You must upload the signed document to the portal.
   All signatures (including your own) must be present!
5. Do not forget that you must also upload an internship contract/letter of acceptance.

5) Submit your application documents. The application deadline is 4 weeks before the start of the internship.

Please note that you are responsible for submitting all documents on time. Your application is only effective once all documents have been received by the International Office or uploaded to the portal. Delays - even if caused by third parties - cannot be taken into account.

If all documents are complete, you will receive a notification of funding. Funding is approved when you and the International Office sign a grant agreement. This agreement serves as a contract between you and Fachhochschule Dortmund. By signing it, you automatically agree to the general funding conditions.
Together with the grant agreement, you will receive the Erasmus+ Charter for Students.

6) Retroactive funding is not possible. This means that a registration/application in the portal after the start of the internship will not be accepted.

7) In accordance with the agreement, the first scholarship installment (70% of the total funding amount) will be transferred to your German bank account. You will receive the second installment after completion of the internship.

Subject to change without notice

It is entirely up to you to decide whether you would like to take a leave of absence for the duration of your internship abroad.

In order to complete your studies within the standard period of study, it is often advisable to apply for a semester of leave for the duration of your stay abroad. Leave semesters are not counted towards the standard period of study. To apply, please contact the Office for Student Affairs .

Due to the budget made available and the national requirements of the DAAD and the associated funding amounts, the maximum funding duration of an ERASMUS internship from the academic year 2023/24 is 130 days/semester plus 2 flat-rate travel days.

The total amount of funding will continue to be calculated on a daily basis at the end of the stay and generally only includes the documented stay at the institution/company.
The amount of funding depends on the destination country; there are three different country groups, divided into countries with a higher, medium and lower cost of living.

Subject to change without notice

Please note that there is no legal entitlement to funding or a specific grant amount.

Students who decide not to travel abroad by plane or car receive up to 4 extra days of travel funding. Travel by train, boat, bus or carpooling is accepted. This must be guaranteed by a sworn declaration, it is not necessary to submit separate proof, but it must be shown on request.

Students where both parents or caregivers do not have a degree from a university or university of applied sciences receive a top-up of €8.33 per funded day (130 x 8.33 = €1082.9).

This must be guaranteed by an affidavit; it is not necessary to submit separate proof.

The Top Ups for first-time graduates and working students cannot be combined, you only receive one of the two!

All Top Ups are applied for in Mobility Online via the workflow steps.

Students who were gainfully employed before the start of the mobility can receive a monthly top-up of €8.33/day under the following conditions:

- The gainful employment must have been carried out continuously for at least six months with a temporal reference to the mobility. Temporal reference here means between 6 months before the application and the start of the mobility.

- The activity in the sending country is not continued during the stay abroad. Notice of termination is not a prerequisite; the employment contract can also be paused.

- During the minimum period of employment, monthly earnings must be above EUR 450 and below EUR 850 (net earnings from all activities per month added together).

- The employment must be subject to social security contributions.

Gainful employment must be guaranteed by an affidavit; it is not necessary to submit separate proof.

The Top Ups for first-time graduates and employed students cannot be combined, you only receive one of the two!

All Top Ups are applied for in Mobility Online via the workflow steps.

Erasmus+ aims to promote equal opportunities and inclusion. For this reason, access to the program is made easier for students from disadvantaged backgrounds (in Germany, this applies to students who are single parents during their studies abroad in the Erasmus+ program) and with special needs.

Special support for students with disabilities

Useful information on disability-friendly universities from the European Agency for Development in Special Needs Education: www.european-agency.org.(Opens in a new tab) 

Special support for students with children as a lump sum

Students who take their child/children with them on an Erasmus+ study visit to a program country and are single parents during their Erasmus+ mobility can receive special funding as a lump sum. The maximum monthly funding amount is determined by three country groups.

The funding application for students with special needs/children must be submitted to the International Office before the start of the stay abroad.

The funding application for students with severe disabilities must be submitted to the DAAD via the International Office at least 2 months before the start of the stay abroad.

1) First language test

You must take a language test before starting your internship abroad. The link will be sent to you by the EU.

2) Update your internship agreement if necessary.

If the content or duration of the internship changes during the course of the internship, please inform the International Office immediately after consultation with your internship institution and faculty. Any changes must be recorded in writing in a new internship agreement.

3) You carry out your internship.

Carry out your internship in accordance with the internship agreement. If you end your ERASMUS internship prematurely, any scholarship installments already paid out must be repaid immediately upon request by the International Office.

4) You submit your certificate of completion/qualified reference.

At the end of your internship (funding period), your internship provider must confirm the exact period and the successful completion of your internship on the basis of the certificate of completion. The certificate must be uploaded to the Mobility Online Portal within 4 weeks of the end of the internship.

5) EU questionnaire

After your internship, you will receive an e-mail from the EU asking you to complete a questionnaire.

6) Experience report

Within 4 weeks of the end of the funding period, you upload an experience report to the Mobility Online Portal.

You will only receive the second installment of your ERASMUS grant (30%) to your German account once all the required documents have been submitted.

Since October 2014, the European Commission has provided an online language test for the five major languages (DE, EN, ES, FR, IT, NL).

This is mandatory for all students/graduates after selection/before the start of the mobility in the working language. However, it is not a selection criterion for funding in the Erasmus+ program and does not apply to native speakers.

Once the participants to be funded in Erasmus+ have been selected, the language test is intended to serve as a placement test to document their current language level.

The systematic, Europe-wide review of the development of individual language skills makes it possible to evaluate the effectiveness of Erasmus+.

All scholarship holders who have taken part in an Erasmus+ mobility measure are obliged to prepare a report on the Mobility Tool Plus at the end of the measure and submit it together with the relevant evidence (e.g. duration of stay). The link to the Mobility Tool Plus is automatically sent to the scholarship holders.

In addition, you will create an experience report for the International Office.
(For information see www.fh-dortmund.de/erfahrungsberichte)

The reports must be completed within 4 weeks of the end of the internship.

Please note that you are not covered by accident insurance through the university during your internship abroad.

The Erasmus+ internship program is purely a funding program. No insurance cover is associated with participation in this program. You must therefore ensure that you have sufficient insurance cover for the duration of your internship abroad.

Sufficient health, accident and liability insurance cover at the workplace is a prerequisite for Erasmus+ internship funding.

Students who complete an internship abroad as part of Erasmus+ (SMP) must have sufficient insurance cover in these three areas:

1) Health insurance
The participant's national health insurance generally provides basic insurance cover for the stay in another EU country with the European Health Insurance Card. However, the coverage provided by the European Health Insurance Card or private insurance may not be sufficient, especially if repatriation or special medical procedures are required. In such cases, supplementary private insurance may be advisable.

2) Liability insurance
Liability insurance covers damage caused by participants during their stay abroad (regardless of whether they are at work or not). As liability regulations vary from country to country, interns run the risk of not being covered.

3) Accident insurance

Accident insurance covers damage caused to employees as a result of accidents at work. In many countries, employees are insured for accidents at work. However, the scope may vary from country to country.

All participants in the ERASMUS+ program have the opportunity to be included in the DAAD group insurance, which offers comprehensive insurance cover.

Further information can be found on the DAAD website(Opens in a new tab) .

• In principle, there is no legal entitlement to funding and therefore no claim can be made against the university. The International Office reserves the right to reject applications if deadlines have not been met and/or the funding has been spent.
• Internships will not be funded retroactively.
• In your own interest, forms should always be completed online.
• All necessary application documents must be uploaded to the Mobiilty Online Portal at least 4 weeks before the start of the internship.

Neither the EU Commission, nor the National Agency for Erasmus+ in Germany (DAAD), nor Fachhochschule Dortmund are liable for damages resulting from illness, death, accident, injury to persons, loss or damage to property in connection with Erasmus+ stays abroad.