ALLOCATION OF FUNDS FOR THE DIGITALIZATION OF ROMANIAN UNIVERSITIES THROUGH THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION'S RECOVERY AND RESILIENCE FACILITY.

The Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) administered by the European Commission is the important part of a temporary financial instrument - NextGenerationEU. Through this mechanism, the European Commission raises funds by borrowing from capital markets, i.e., issuing bonds on behalf of the European Union. Out of the €750 billion for NextGenerationEU, €672.5 billion have been allocated to the Recovery and Resilience Facility to finance the Recovery and Resilience Plans developed by the member states of the European Union. Thus, Romania has also developed its own Recovery and Resilience Plan establishing its priority areas of investment, approved by the Council of the European Union in October 2021. This paper refers to the allocation of funds through the National Recovery and Resilience Plan for Component C15: Education, Investment 16: Digitalization of universities, and their preparation for the digital professions of the future. For the digitalization of state and private universities in Romania and their preparation for the digital professions of the future, a competitive call for projects was launched in 2022, with a financial allocation of 234 million euros excluding VAT (VAT is covered by the national state budget). With a limit of 3.9 million euros per university, each university in Romania had the opportunity to participate in the competition for the acquisition of digital infrastructure and the development of advanced digital skills for members of the academic community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]