# Gender differences in career trajectories of parents and their implications for gender equality and family well-being
EUACC page: https://www.euacc.ai/calls/HORIZON-CL2-2025-02-TRANSFO-04-two-stage
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## Public content

**topic id:** HORIZON-CL2-2025-02-TRANSFO-04-two-stage
**call id:** HORIZON-CL2-2025-02-TWO-STAGE
**title:** Gender differences in career trajectories of parents and their implications for gender equality and family well-being
**programme:** Horizon Europe
**cluster:** CL2
**status:** closed
**deadline date:** 2026-03-17T00:00:00+00:00
**deadline model:** two-stage
**start date:** 2025-05-15T00:00:00+00:00
**url:** https://ec.europa.eu/info/funding-tenders/opportunities/portal/screen/opportunities/topic-details/HORIZON-CL2-2025-02-TRANSFO-04-two-stage
**description:** Expected Outcome:
Projects should contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:
• Policymakers, social partners, and other relevant stakeholders have better understanding of gender differences in career trajectories of parents and their consequences for gender inequalities in the labour market and within households.
• Policymakers, social partners, and other relevant stakeholders have better understanding of links between parental career- and childcare-related decisions, family well-being, and different policy/institutional settings.
• Providing policymakers with effective policy options that help reduce gender gaps in labour market outcomes of parents and support family well-being. 
 Scope:
Gender differences in career trajectories of parents account for large shares of gender employment and pay gaps. This is often referred to as child/motherhood penalties for women (as opposed to child/fatherhood premium for men). 
The research proposals should identify key gender differences in careers of parents and assess how they affect at least some of the current gender gaps in socio-economic outcomes such as employment, entrepreneurship, choice of occupation, pay, career opportunities, working conditions, (mental) health, or poverty risks. The research should take an intersectional perspective, considering that career trajectories of women and men also depend on other individual and household characteristics, such as household composition (e.g. single parents), socio-economic status, gender identity (e.g. LGBTIQ parents), migrant background or racial or ethnic origin.
The proposals should assess key positive and negative consequences of different career trajectories of parents for families, taking into consideration the diversity of family arrangements, age and number of children (with emphasis on pre-school ages), quality and stability of family relationships, the availability of economic and social resources, and family well-being. 
The proposals should analyse key drivers of parental career and household-related decisions, paying particular attention to the division of unpaid childcare within households, social and cultural norms and stereotypes, work cultures in different economic sectors and occupations, and institutional and policy settings (e.g. childcare, maternity/paternity/parental leaves and other work-life balance policies such as flexible working arrangements or telework). 
Where applicable, proposals should leverage the data and services available through European Research Infrastructures federated under the European Open Science Cloud, as well as data from relevant Data Spaces. Particular efforts should be made to ensure that the data produced in the context of this topic is FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Re-usable).
The proposals should: 
• Explore the use of longitudinal data from administrative or survey sources on parental careers and/or children’s well-being;
• Explore both individual and structural drivers of gender differences in career trajectories of parents through quantitative models;
• Provide in-depth insight into careers of mothers and fathers, and their implications for family well-being, through qualitative research and case studies. 
 Within the broad scope of SSH research described above, the proposals are encouraged to pay particular attention to:
• Exploring how specific features of early childhood education and care systems (e.g. quality, availability or affordability) affect child participation and family wellbeing;
• Exploring how child/parent friendly workplaces and organisational cultures affect parental careers and family well-being;
• Quantifying economic costs of child/motherhood penalties;
• Reflecting on how child/motherhood penalties affect women from migrant backgrounds, for example in the context of migration flows following the Russia’s war of aggression on Ukraine;
• Investigating the impact of heteronormative norms, discrimination, and support systems on LGBTIQ parents’ career trajectories and family well-being.
**conditions:** General conditions
1. Admissibility Conditions: Proposal page limit and layout
As described in Annex A and Annex E of the Horizon Europe Work Programme General Annexes.
Proposal page limits and layout: described in Part B of the Application Form available in the Submission System.
The page limit for the Part B for the first stage of the 2-stage call is 10 pages.
The second stage application will have a separate submission session with the applicable templates.
The page limit for the Part B for the second stage of the 2-stage call will be maximum 50 pages.
In addition, it is mandatory to submit a detailed budget table, using the template available in the Submission System (version 3.4). 

2. Eligible Countries
As described in Annex B of the Work Programme General Annexes.
A number of non-EU/non-Associated Countries that are not automatically eligible for funding have made specific provisions for making funding available for their participants in Horizon Europe projects. See the information in the Horizon Europe Programme Guide.

3. Other Eligible Conditions
As described in Annex B of the Work Programme General Annexes.

4. Financial and operational capacity and exclusion
As described in Annex C of the Work Programme General Annexes.

5a. Evaluation and award: Award criteria, scoring and thresholds
As are described in Annex D of the Work Programme General Annexes.

5b. Evaluation and award: Submission and evaluation processes
As described in Annex F of the Work Programme General Annexes and the Online Manual.

5c. Evaluation and award: Indicative timeline for evaluation and grant agreement
As described in Annex F of the Work Programme General Annexes.

6. Legal and financial set-up of the grants
Eligible costs will take the form of a lump sum as defined in the Decision of 7 July 2021 authorising the use of lump sum contributions under the Horizon Europe Programme – the Framework Programme for Research and Innovation (2021-2027) – and in actions under the Research and Training Programme of the European Atomic Energy Community (2021-2025) [[This decision is available on the Funding and Tenders Portal, in the reference documents section for Horizon Europe, under ‘Simplified costs decisions’ or through this link: https://ec.europa.eu/info/funding-tenders/opportunities/docs/2021-2027/horizon/guidance/ls-decision_he_en.pdf]].

In addition, as described in Annex G of the Work Programme General Annexes.

Specific conditions
 described in the [specific topic of the Work Programme]

Application and evaluation forms and model grant agreement (MGA):
 Application form templates — the application form specific to this call is available in the Submission System
Standard application form (HE RIA IA Stage 1) 
Standard application form (HE RIA, IA) - only for information, applicable only for the second stage of the application process
Evaluation form templates — will be used with the necessary adaptations 
Standard evaluation form (HE RIA, IA and CSA Stage 1) 
Standard evaluation form (HE RIA, IA) - only for information, applicable only for the second stage of the evaluation process
Guidance
HE Programme Guide 
Model Grant Agreements (MGA)
Lump Sum MGA 
Call-specific instructions 
Detailed budget table (HE LS) - only for information, applicable only for the second stage of the application process
Guidance: "Lump sums - what do I need to know?"

Additional documents:
 HE Main Work Programme 2025 – 1. General Introduction
HE Main Work Programme 2025 – 5. Culture, creativity and inclusive society
HE Main Work Programme 2025 – 14. General Annexes
HE Programme Guide
HE Framework Programme 2021/695
HE Specific Programme Decision 2021/764 
EU Financial Regulation 2024/2509
Decision authorising the use of lump sum contributions under the Horizon Europe Programme
Rules for Legal Entity Validation, LEAR Appointment and Financial Capacity Assessment 
EU Grants AGA — Annotated Model Grant Agreement 
Funding & Tenders Portal Online Manual 
Funding & Tenders Portal Terms and Conditions 
Funding & Tenders Portal Privacy Statement
**action type:** HORIZON  Research and Innovation Actions
**budget:** 
  **budget Years Columns:** 
    - 2025
  **budget Topic Action Map:** 
    **110753:** 
      -         **action:** HORIZON-CL2-2025-02-TRANSFO-04-two-stage - HORIZON-RIA HORIZON  Research and Innovation Actions
        **budget Year Map:** 
          **2025:** 10200000
        **deadline Dates:** 
          - 2025-09-16
          - 2026-03-17
        **deadline Model:** two-stage
        **expected Grants:** 3
        **max Contribution:** 3400000
        **min Contribution:** 3400000
        **planned Opening Date:** 2025-05-15
    **110754:** 
      -         **action:** HORIZON-CL2-2025-02-HERITAGE-02-two-stage - HORIZON-RIA HORIZON  Research and Innovation Actions
        **budget Year Map:** 
          **2025:** 12000000
        **deadline Dates:** 
          - 2025-09-16
          - 2026-03-17
        **deadline Model:** two-stage
        **expected Grants:** 3
        **max Contribution:** 4000000
        **min Contribution:** 3000000
        **planned Opening Date:** 2025-05-15
**keywords:** HORIZON-CL2-2025-02-TRANSFO-04-two-stage, HORIZON-CL2-2025-02-TWO-STAGE, Econometrics, statistical methods, Gender in economics, Households, family and fertility, Social economics, Women and gender studies
**last synced at:** 2026-11-09T17:23:17.403+00:00

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