Undertaking a period of international mobility as part of a degree can be a transformative experience for many students, but a semester or year abroad will not be possible for everyone. Financial pressures, caring responsibilities, disabilities, work commitments or the prospect of spending a long period away from existing support networks can all affect whether a student is able – or willing – to participate.
As UK universities prepare to return to Erasmus+ in 2027, Blended Intensive Programmes (BIPs) offer another route to international experience. By combining collaborative online learning with a short period of physical mobility, they provide institutions with an opportunity to broaden the range of mobility experiences available to their students.
So, what might that actually look like?
Picture a group of nursing, computer science and public health students at universities in Poland, Portugal and Wales, working online on a shared challenge: to design a remote-monitoring tool for patients in rural areas. Each student brings a different discipline, cultural perspective and experience of their own national healthcare system to the same problem.
After several weeks of virtual collaboration, they meet all together in person for an intensive period of testing their prototype with real patients and clinicians, comparing approaches during clinical visits and navigating living in a new country, albeit for a few weeks. Learning how each country’s students had been trained to think about care, data and technology may turn out to be some of the richest learning of the whole programme.
International mobility does not always have to begin at an airport, or even a train station. Sometimes, it can start in the classroom.
Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) is one way that universities are already connecting students and academics across countries through structured collaborative learning. COIL and BIPs are not the same thing, but COIL activity can provide a useful foundation for a BIP where the academic relationships, experience of collaborative teaching and a shared curriculum may already be in place. Erasmus+ provides an opportunity to adapt COILs, add a short period of physical mobility and create a BIP.
From online collaboration to physical mobility
We already know that this type of collaborative international learning can work at scale. COIL is partnership-based by design, bringing students and staff together with peers at international universities and, in some cases, professional or industry partners.
At Coventry University, more than 10,000 students have participated in COIL over the past three years, working with international partners on a variety of projects. These range from designing buildings for urban contexts in Coventry and Dubai and developing robotics and digital applications with international peers, to performing Shakespeare live across stages in two countries connected by screen. Alongside internationalising the curriculum, these collaborations give students practical experience of working across cultures, disciplines and borders
For institutions already delivering this kind of activity, the UK’s association to Erasmus+ and BIPs funding creates an opportunity to consider what could happen if physical mobility were added.
A BIP must bring together at least three higher education institutions from Erasmus+ programme countries (and beyond) to jointly develop a short, intensive, credit-bearing programme. Students undertake a virtual component alongside a short period of physical mobility, which can be used for collaborative learning, teaching, fieldwork and other activities.
A BIP must award students at least 3 European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS) credits, and the lead university partner applies for the Erasmus+ funding and distributes it across the group. Students at institutions holding an Erasmus Charter for Higher Education (ECHE) typically receive around €79 a day towards costs for the first two weeks of physical mobility, tapering off after that.
The BIP’s organisational funding can also cover related costs such as student meals, easing the load on tight programme budgets. Global partners from non-programme countries can take part too – but funding for their students is more limited, so most currently join on a self-funded basis or through separate arrangements.
Take the digital health example above: students could work online with their international peers before traveling to one of the three participating universities for practical workshops, site visits, fieldwork and intensive collaboration with the peers they’ve already been getting to know for weeks.
For universities with established COIL activity, some of the hardest to establish foundations for BIPs collaboration may therefore already exist: trusted academic relationships, a shared subject interest and experience of designing teaching across institutions.
Institutions newer to COIL do not need to start from scratch either. UNICOIL, the UK and Ireland COIL Network, brings together institutions and practitioners to build COIL capacity, share expertise and develop a supportive community around collaborative online international learning. Professor Martin Ward's blog on the launch of UNICOIL tells that story in more detail, including COIL in action at Leeds and how a 2025 symposium turned into a formal network now spanning 11 universities across the UK, Ireland and beyond.
BIPs are one route among several
It’s worth noting that BIPs are not the only way Erasmus+ supports shorter international experiences. The programme also funds blended traineeships, combining a short physical placement abroad of between five and 30 days with a virtual component, which can suit students looking for a workplace or community-based experience rather than a credit-bearing academic one. Institutions building out their wider mobility offer may want to consider how these different routes complement each other.
Universities are not starting from zero on short mobility either. The Turing scheme and Taith have funded placements of one and two weeks or more, respectively, so institutions already have established processes for short-duration logistics, funding and student support. What’s different about BIPs is that they are credit-bearing by design, unlike Turing and Taith, and with both schemes soon ending, the sector must consider how to build the credit-bearing route before the funding application opens.
Why shorter and blended mobility matters
UUKi research has shown that shorter mobility can help broaden participation among students who have traditionally been less likely to go abroad. The report Short-term mobility, long-term impact found that students who went on mobility had notably better graduate outcomes than their peers, and that the vast majority of short-term mobility students were more likely to consider working abroad after graduation. This suggests that shorter experiences often build appetite for further international engagement rather than substituting for it.
This matters because the benefits of international experience are significant. Our Gone international: a new generation report demonstrates an association between mobility and improved academic and graduate outcomes, including for students from less advantaged backgrounds. Mobile students were awarded first-class degrees at a markedly higher rate than non-mobile students (39.0% versus 30.9%, as a five-year average) and went on to secure professional-level jobs at higher rates too (75.9% versus 72.0%). That pattern held for students from less advantaged backgrounds, with 36.1% of mobile students being awarded a first-class degree compared with 28.2% of non-mobile students.
Shorter mobility is not a replacement for a semester or year abroad – it provides another option for students for whom longer mobility may not be possible or desirable. For some, it will be the perfect international experience in its own right; for others, it may provide an achievable first step towards a longer period abroad in future.
BIPs give universities another tool to build that flexibility into their mobility offer. By combining online collaboration with a short physical experience, students can develop relationships with their international peers before travelling and can continue their learning beyond the period spent abroad.
What does a BIP look like?
Universities do not need to imagine what this could look like from scratch. UK students and academics have already been participating in BIPs through existing European partnerships.
At the University of Glasgow, academics and students have participated in BIPs through the CIVIS European University Alliance. One programme brings together expertise from Stockholm, Glasgow, Bucharest and Rome around water pollution, holistic approaches and nature-based solutions.
The experience is deliberately practical. Students combine lectures with fieldwork, collecting samples, visiting relevant sites and learning directly from the location in which the BIP is hosted. They also work alongside students and academics at similar stages of their careers from different countries, developing subject knowledge alongside international networks.
Another BIP involving University of Glasgow focuses on Roman studies and has been running for four years. Master’s and doctoral students learn together through teaching, visits to museums and historical sites, and practical activities such as coin-handling sessions. When activities have taken place in the UK, this has included visiting Hadrian’s Wall and exclusive access to museum archives.
The intensive nature of these programmes can offer something distinct from both online collaboration and longer mobility. Glasgow colleagues described students developing both technical skills relevant to their disciplines and wider skills such as intercultural communication, collaboration and adaptability within highly international groups, including programmes bringing together participants speaking as many as 11 languages. These are increasingly important capabilities as universities prepare graduates to work across cultures, disciplines and borders in a changing labour world. Exposure to postgraduate students has also encouraged some master’s students to consider PhD study themselves.
There are benefits for staff too. Academics involved have been able to see how colleagues in other countries approach teaching, build research networks and develop new collaborations. Relationships created through these activities have subsequently fed into other international research and partnership opportunities.
You don’t have to lead a BIP to get involved
For institutions rebuilding their Erasmus+ engagement in 2027, getting involved does not necessarily have to begin with designing a new programme.
There are two routes worth exploring.
Universities with established academic relationships, existing COIL activity or an idea that would benefit from intensive international collaboration can consider developing and leading a BIP with their European partners. This provides an opportunity to shape the academic content around institutional expertise and bring international students and staff to your own campus.
But institutions can also join BIPs that partners are already developing. This can provide a useful way for academics, mobility teams and students to experience how the model works before deciding whether to lead one themselves.
Existing BIPs seeking partners or participants can be explored through the BIP Registry, while universities should also speak directly to their existing European partners about programmes they are already running or planning.
For institutions returning to Erasmus+ after several years outside the programme, joining and participating first can provide a valuable opportunity to learn. For others, 2027 may be the right time to lead, especially for those involved in alliances.
Either way, the conversations can start now.
Six questions universities can ask themselves
As institutions prepare for Erasmus+ participation in 2027, there are five questions worth considering:
- Are there groups of students currently underrepresented in our mobility activity who might benefit from shorter international opportunities?
- Are our academics already delivering COIL, virtual exchange or similar forms of collaborative international teaching?
- Which of our existing European partners are already involved in BIPs, and could our students or staff join them?
- With 2026–27 being the final year of the Turing Scheme, which students currently accessing shorter mobility through those schemes will need a route into Erasmus+ once that funding ends?
- Which areas of our curriculum lend themselves to an intensive international programme, either within one subject or across several disciplines?
- Who needs to be involved internally to make this work – academics, international and mobility teams, curriculum and quality colleagues, or others?
The answers may reveal that many of the foundations are already there.
Opening another door
UK universities do not need to wait until 2027 to start these conversations. Existing COIL activity, established European partnerships and BIPs already taking place across the programme all provide valuable starting points.
A semester or year abroad will remain the right choice for many students, but it won’t be the right choice for all of them – and BIPs offer a different kind of route into mobility experience: one that starts with a shared problem, a community and a screen, and only later needs a passport.