European Commission - DG EAC

The overall objective of this contract is to help improve the ability of DG Education and Culture to support the achievement of the EU's equal opportunities policies (gender equality and equal opportunities for disabled people). The aim was to evaluate the current and developing activities and practices undertaken within the DG's programmes or other initiatives in this field. The evaluation has as well contributed to the identification of replicable good practicies and of the barriers and risks encountered.

The Tempus programme and its equivalent for USA/Canada support cooperation between EU and non-EU countries. Previous evaluations concluded that there are repeating problems in terms of sustainability of the projects outputs. This study of the sustainability factors of international cooperation projects like Tempus relies on 3 workshops gathering together representative of the Phare, Tacis and Meda countries as well as documentary analysis. In a second stage the explanatory hypotheses on the sustainability factors are tested by an on-line questionnaire survey and 10 case studies.

The aim of the evaluation of the European Year of Education through Sport (EYES) was to assess to what extent the goals of the EYES have been achieved and to suggest how the work should be continued, or what new follow-up initiatives should be devised. The evaluation has analysed the achievements and implementation of the EYES in 28 countries (European Union + Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein) and has formulated an assment based on the criteria of relevance, coherence, effectiveness, efficiency and impact.