Tel mee met Taal (Count on skills) subsidy scheme opens on 1 January
From 1 January up to and including 28 February 2022, you can again apply for the 2021-2024 Tel mee met Taal (Count on skills) subsidy scheme. The subsidy scheme has been revised slightly compared with 2021.
The 2021-2024 Tel mee met Taal (Count on skills) subsidy scheme enables employers, schools, libraries and other organizations to improve the basic skills of adults and prevent educational delays in children. The subjects involved are language, numeracy and digital skills. In 2022, a total of €2.9 million is available for low-literate employees, €1.3 million for low-literate parents and €625,000 for experiments.
Changes
The subsidy scheme has been changed on a few points for 2022. These changes are detailed below.
Numeracy and digital skills
Up to now, it has only been possible to apply for a training programme for numeracy or digital skills for employees or parents who additionally have low language skills. The rationale was that low language skills are the underlying problem, also in relation to low numeracy or digital skills. However, there is not always such an overlap. For example, there are older employees who have adequate language skills, but no digital skills. For this reason, from 2022 it will be possible to apply for training programmes for numeracy and digital skills for employees and parents who only have low scores for these specific skills.
Experiments
In 2021, applications for experiments could focus on improving the quality of the courses or on reaching and/or referring potential course participants. After lots had been drawn, the vast majority of subsidies in 2021 were allocated to projects focusing on quality improvement. In 2022, therefore, applications may only be submitted that focus on reaching, motivating or referring potential course participants.
Grant applications for experiments are assessed on five criteria. Up to now, these have had equal weighting, but from 2022, the weighting of the criteria will be adjusted. ‘Relevance of the application’ and ‘Quality of the activity plan’ now count for 30 percent each, ‘Support and collaboration’ 20 percent, and ‘Practicability and feasibility’ and ‘Budget’ 10 percent each. The criterion ‘Support and collaboration’ was previously only ‘Support’. This has been expanded to encourage collaboration with other parties.
The Caribbean Netherlands
Parties from the Caribbean Netherlands have been able to apply for subsidies under the Tel mee met Taal (Count on skills) programme since 2021. Because the subsidy scheme has been oversubscribed in recent years (especially the sub-scheme aimed at low-literate parents), allocation has had to be decided by drawing lots. To ensure that applications from the Caribbean Netherlands can also be honoured, €100,000 has been earmarked for this purpose from 2022. Half of this amount is available for the sub-scheme employers and the other half for the sub-scheme low-literate parents.
Further information
Read the full amended 2021-2024 Tel mee met Taal (Count on skills) Subsidy Scheme.
If you would you like to know more about applying for the subsidy, see our subsidy page.