National Call for Promoting Integrity Principles in Education

The EUACI is a collaborative initiative funded by the European Union and the Government of Denmark, with the aim of supporting Ukraine in its efforts to reduce corruption at both national and local levels. The new phase, launched in January 2024, focuses on key strategic objectives: reducing corruption in Ukraine, advancing anticorruption reforms, and implementing reconstruction efforts in war-affected areas with a strong emphasis on transparency, accountability, and integrity.

The EUACI operates across four intervention areas:

1. Support to independent state institutions fighting and preventing corruption
2. Transparency and accountability of the reconstruction process
3. Support for cities in war-affected areas to enhance integrity in the reconstruction process
4. Civil society and media engagement in preventing and fighting corruption

This National Call for Promoting Integrity Principles in Education is announced under Intervention Area 4: Civil society and media engagement in preventing and fighting corruption.

Background

Promoting integrity from an early age is essential for building a culture of zero tolerance toward corruption. Schools serve as foundational institutions where civic values, ethical behaviour, and social responsibility are cultivated. Recognizing this, EUACI has worked for many years to support integrity in the education sector in Ukraine, in close partnership with national stakeholders, including the National Agency on Corruption Prevention.

The active engagement of young Ukrainians in advocating for the independence of anti-corruption institutions underscores their strong commitment to combating corruption. This demonstrates the critical importance of educating and promoting the principles of integrity among the younger generation. Fostering these values within youth is essential to sustaining public support for transparent and accountable anti-corruption bodies in Ukraine.

Building on the Integrity Strategy, this grant competition aims to further scale these efforts by supporting civil society initiatives that promote integrity principles among pupils and students, educators, and parents through practical, targeted, and community-based interventions.

The competition seeks to support projects that advance integrity in school and university education through inclusive and replicable solutions. Supported initiatives should engage teachers, students, school leadership, active parents, and local education authorities across various regions and types of settlements in Ukraine.

Objectives and priority issues

Lot 1. School education. Goals and Objectives.

The goal of this grant competition is to promote a culture of integrity in Ukraine’s school education system by supporting civil society organizations in developing, piloting, and disseminating educational, communication, and community-based initiatives.

The competition seeks to empower teachers, students, and parents as active agents of integrity and foster systemic change through inclusive, practical, and scalable approaches that strengthen transparency, accountability, and civic values in the learning environment.

Main Objectives of the Competition

1. Support teachers and school administrations in becoming champions of integrity within the education system.
2. Promote integrity education among students through interactive, participatory, and engaging learning formats.
3. Involve parents in fostering integrity values both at home and within the school community.
4. Identify, collect, and disseminate best practices and methodological tools to enable wider application and replication.

Target Audiences

• Teachers and school administration
• Local education authorities
• Civil society organizations working in education
• Parents and parent committees
• Pupil self-governance bodies and active youth

Types of Projects That May Be Supported

1. Supporting Teachers and School Administration as Agents of Integrity

• Training and workshops for educators.
• Dissemination of best teaching practices.
• Support for leadership training and networking for school administrators.
• Competition and awards for the best integrity teachers.
• Developing transparent school budgets, public hearings.

2. Initiatives for Active Pupils and Student Self-Governance

• Integrity-themed interactive sessions, lessons, and quests.
• Organization of Integrity Weeks, school competitions, and campaigns.
• Hotline, counselling for students facing a corruption situation.

3. Engaging Parents in Promoting Integrity

• Public events, lectures, podcasts or video series for parents.
• Developing tools to strengthen the role of parents in promoting school integrity.

Expected Activities of Supported Projects

• Educational Component: Capacity-building activities, material development, and methodological guidance.
• Networking Component: Platforms for experience exchange between educators, students, and parents.
• Communications Component: Open publication of developed materials, public promotion of integrity values, and outreach campaigns.

Geographic

All regions of Ukraine are eligible. Priority will be given to proposals that include participation of schools from diverse regions and settlement types (cities, towns, and villages). Projects are encouraged to cooperate with the NACP’s “Transparent School” initiative if relevant.

Budget

• Total competition budget for LOT 1: EUR 100,000
• Expected number of grants: 2-3
• Optimum grant size: up to EUR 30,000
• Maximum grant size: EUR 50,000
• Implementation period: 6 to 12 months

Lot 2. University Education. Goals and Objectives:

The goal of this grant competition is to foster a culture of integrity within Ukraine’s higher education system by supporting civil society organizations in developing, piloting, and disseminating educational, communication, and community-based initiatives targeted at university students.
The competition aims to empower students and faculty as active promoters of integrity and transparency, fostering systemic change through inclusive, practical, and scalable approaches that strengthen accountability, ethical behaviour, and civic engagement in the university environment.

Main Objectives of the Competition

1. Promote integrity education among students through interactive, participatory, and engaging formats.
2. Foster student leadership and self-governance structures that prioritize and uphold integrity values.
3. Development of educational materials to promote integrity principles for specific academic programs and/or student self-governance.

Target Audiences

• Student self-governance bodies and active student groups.
• University alumni networks.
• Opinion leaders in the universities.
• University faculty and academic staff.
• University administrations and student affairs offices.
• Civil society organizations working in higher education.

Types of Projects That May Be Supported

• Communication and social media campaign to promote integrity principles.
• Conduct public events, interactive sessions, debates, etc for the student community to promote integrity principles.
• Training, workshops, and capacity building for faculty and administrators.
• Public lectures, podcasts, webinars, and discussion forums on integrity and ethical leadership.
• Alumni engagement programs promoting integrity values and mentoring.
• Supporting platforms for experience exchange among universities, students, and civil society actors.
• Hotline, counselling for students facing a corruption situation.

Geographic Scope

All regions of Ukraine are eligible. Priority will be given to proposals involving universities from diverse regions and various types of higher education institutions. Projects are encouraged to collaborate with existing national initiatives promoting transparency and integrity in education.

Budget

• Total competition budget for LOT 2: EUR 50,000
• Expected number of grants: 2-3
• Optimum grant size: up to EUR 20,000
• Maximum grant size: EUR 25,000
• Implementation period: 6 to 12 months

Eligibility criteria

Applicants must:

• Be a legal entity officially registered according to Ukrainian legislation
• Be a nonprofit civil society organization with codes 0032, 0034, 0036, 0038, 0039.
• Have proven organizational capacity to manage and implement grants.
• Demonstrate experience working with schools, parents, or student self-governance bodies, universities, and student self-government organizations.
• Applications may be submitted individually or in consortia/partnerships/networks

A positive financial assessment by the EUACI of the selected project will be a condition for receiving support.

Evaluation criteria

Proposals will be evaluated based on:

• Compliance with formal eligibility criteria
• Relevance to the objectives of the call
• Experience and expertise of the organization
• Project feasibility, clarity, and potential for impact
• Budget clarity and cost-effectiveness
• Sustainability and scalability of proposed solutions

Evaluation will be conducted by a Selection Committee composed of external education and integrity experts, along with EUACI team members.

The evaluation of received proposals will be based on the following overall criteria:

Eligibility of costs

Only eligible costs can be covered by a grant. See annex E.

Ethics and code of conduct

Grant applicants are expected to live up to high ethical standards as well as organisational integrity, including respect for human rights as well as environmental legislation, compliance with core labour standards and zero-tolerance for sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment (SEAH), corruption, money-laundering and terrorism. Applicants may be excluded at any stage of the selection process if they do not live up to requirements in this area.

Duration, grant size and number of proposals to be selected

The planned duration of the proposal must not be less than 6 months and must not exceed 12 months.

The overall indicative amount made available under this Call for proposals is 150,000 EUR.

Lot 1

• Total competition budget for LOT 1: EUR 100,000
• Expected number of grants: 2-3
• Optimum grant size: up to EUR 30,000
• Maximum grant size: EUR 50,000

Lot 2

• Total competition budget for LOT 2: EUR 50,000
• Expected number of grants: 2-3
• Optimum grant size: up to EUR 20,000
• Maximum grant size: EUR 25,000
• Application and selection process

To apply for this call for proposals, applicants must provide information about the organisations/entities involved in the proposal by completing the Background information form (see template in Annex F).

The MFA is not obliged to fully support the proposals submitted. Hence, the MFA will inform the lead applicants who have been preselected about their tentative level of funding and give feedback to the concept note. However, the MFA shall not define any activity and/or output, as this would constitute grounds for a procurement process instead of a grant award.

Applicants must complete the Project Proposal (Annex 1) and Project Budget (Annex 2), Background information (see template in Annex F) forms in English and submit them via email to: [email protected] and cc [email protected] with the subject line: National Call – Promoting Integrity Principles in School Education.

Applications received after the deadline or without a detailed budget will not be considered.

If you do not receive a confirmation of receipt within 3 working days, please contact: [email protected]

Information Session

A presentation of the grant call will be held on September 3, 2025, at 12:00 Kyiv time in both online and offline formats.

• Online broadcast: EUACI YouTube channel and Facebook page
• Registration link: https://forms.gle/gtnpErWc5qmGJrgP7

Questions and Clarifications

Questions in English or Ukrainian should be sent to [email protected]  and [email protected] no later than September 25, 2025, at 17:00 Kyiv time with a clear reference to the title of the call “National Call for Promoting Integrity Principles in Education”. EUACI may decline to respond to questions submitted after this deadline.

Please note that EUACI will not provide prior assessments of applicant eligibility or proposal content.

The project proposal will be evaluated and scored by the MFA Evaluation Committee.

The MFA will make the final selection of application(s) based on the scoring of the full project proposals. The MFA will inform the applicants about the outcome of the evaluation by October 20, 2025.

The MFA reserves the right to reject applications that do not conform to the instructions at any stage of the selection process.

Final eligibility assessment

Before the final award of a grant, the MFA must conduct a final eligibility assessment, e.g., by requiring supporting documents and initiating further inquiries as part of the MFA’s obligation to carry out a partner assessment/ due diligence review (cf. MFA Financial Management Guidelines for Development Cooperation)[1].  The purpose of this assessment is to ascertain grant recipients’ financial, operational, and organisational capacity and compliance with general safeguards and MFA requirements.

Administration and dialogue with the MFA

The call for proposals and the subsequent project/grant will be managed by Component 4: Civil society and media engagement in preventing and fighting corruption.

The grant will be administered according to the Guidelines for bilateral cooperation Guidelines for Programmes, Projects, Country Strategic Frameworks & Hard Earmarked Multilateral Support]

Tentative timetable for the application and selection process

[1] https://amg.um.dk/bilateral-cooperation/financial-management