Grant Opportunity: Military-Connected LEA for Academic and Support Programs
Through the Department of Defense, the Military-Connected Local Educational Agencies for Academic and Support Programs (MCASP) grant opportunity is now open.
“The DoDEA Partnership Grant Program supports research-based programs to increase student achievement and ease the challenges that military children face due to their parents’ military service. The grant program provides resources to military-connected local educational agencies (LEAs) to develop and implement projects that are designed to:
– Enhance and expand instructional supports to help students meet the requirements of rigorous curriculum
– Provide structures to support the social and emotional needs of military students
– Increase advanced placement and virtual learning communities, improve educator knowledge and skills through professional development, increase opportunities for students to study strategic languages, provide enhanced services for students with disabilities, enhance and integrate technology into the classroom, and engage parents in supporting students’ college and career readiness.”
Who Can Apply: Independent school districts that have at least one participating school with twenty-five percent or greater military dependent student enrollment, at least fifty percent of participating schools have a military dependent student enrollment of twenty-five percent or above, and the remaining percentage of participating schools may have between ten and twenty-five percent military dependent student enrollment.
Awards: An estimated total of $30,000,000 dollars is available, with 35 awards ranging between $250,000 and $1,500,000 expected to be made.
Application Due Date: May 5th, 2015
To get complete information and access the RFP, visit the grant opportunity page on grants.gov .
Featured Grant Opportunity: School Justice Collaboration Program: Keeping Kids in School and Out of Court
The Office of Juvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention is offering a federal grant opportunity, titled School Justice Collaboration Program: Keeping Kids in School and Out of Court. The OJDDP is partnering with the Department of Education and Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) for this program.
The goal of the program is to enhance collaboration and coordination among schools, mental and behavioral health specialists, law enforcement, and juvenile justice officials at the local level to ensure adults have the support, training, and a shared framework to help students succeed in school and prevent negative outcomes for youth and communities.
Further Information on eligibility from grants.gov:
This initiative includes two categories, and the eligibility differs for each:
• Category 1: Local School Justice Collaboration Program. Applicants are limited to local juvenile and family courts (including rural and tribal juvenile and family courts) that can verify that they have a partnership—with a local education agency (LEA) that has applied to the Department of Education’s School Climate Transformation Grants-LEA (SCTG) and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration Now Is the Time Project AWARE–LEA programs. Additionally, applicants must partner with local law enforcement (via subgrants) as part of their collaborative effort. To meet these eligibility criteria, applicants must provide a letter of commitment or agreement, as described in the RFP, and the Grants.gov tracking numbers for the SCTG and Project AWARE grant programs applications. Awards under this category may be made only to juvenile and family courts in communities that have been awarded Department of Education School Climate Transformation Grants. A factor that will be considered in selection is whether an application also provides a plan to collaborate with the LEA on SAMHSA’s Now Is The Time Project AWARE-LEA program.
• Category 2: School Justice Collaboration Program National Training and Technical Assistance. Applicants are limited to nonprofit and for-profit organizations (including tribal nonprofit and for-profit organizations) and institutions of higher education (including tribal institutions of higher education). For-profit organizations must agree to forgo any profit or management fee.
When is the Deadline? July 21st, 2014.
Where Can I Get More Information? Visit the grant program page at grants.gov
2014 PEP Grant Awards Are Coming Soon!
Yesterday we started hearing about schools being notified by members of Congress that they had won 2014 Carol M. White PEP grants! If you applied for a PEP grant in 2013 and scored highly but did not win, it’s possible you may be selected for a 2014 award since the US Department of Education (ED/US ED) is funding down the slate this year rather than holding a new PEP grant competition. This means new applications are not being accepted in 2014, BUT new awards will still be made. The pool of eligible applicants in 2014 includes all 2013 PEP grant applicants who did not win an award in 2014. Applications are not re-scored, however, and awards are made based on reviewer scores, so those who scored well in 2013 will be in the best positions for 2014 awards.
If you have been selected for an award in 2014, you may or may not hear the news first from your House Rep and/or Senator. Not all members choose to contact their constituents. Either way, if you’ve won an award this year, ED will email and/or mail your organization an official Grant Award Notification (GAN) document in the near future.
The full list of 2014 PEP grant winners should be out very soon now that Congressional notifications have begun. We’ll post it here when it’s available. Good luck to all 2013 applicants in the running for 2014!
Featured Grant Opportunity: The Colorado Health Foundation Healthy Schools
The Colorado Health Foundation offers a grant program with community outcome areas of Healthy Living, Health Care and Health Coverage. The Foundation looks for integrated approaches that take full advantage of each and every opportunity to improve the health of all Colorado residents.
We’re providing basic information about the grant program, for complete details visit The Colorado Health Foundation Grantmaking Page.
Program Overview: In more detail, the three outcomes are: to ensure access to the key components of Healthy Living, increase the number of Colorado residents with Health Coverage, and ensure access to quality, coordinated Health Care. The section of the grant program that we will be focusing on is the Healthy Schools outcome under Healthy Living. This outcome provides funding for programs that make Colorado’s schools healthier. Nutrition, activity, education, access to health services, and community support are all funding areas mentioned by the program.
Award: The Foundation does not provide minimum, maximum or average request information. Instead, the Foundation notes that award sizes vary based on multiple factors and also states, “We favor proposals that include other funders and that show how proposed activities will be continued after the grant term is completed.” Insight’s review of grants awarded by The Colorado Healthy Foundation for the Healthy Living outcome area between January 2007 and January 2014 showed grant awards ranged from $5,000 to $8,748,005, with 74.8% of awards falling in the $20,000 to $400,000 range. Request the amount you need and can justify in order to launch a high-quality, sustainable project.
Who Can Apply: Colorado organizations classified as tax-exempt under section 501(c)(3), Colorado public agencies, including state and local governments, and new or emerging organizations without 501(c)(3) status with a tax-exempt organization acting as fiscal sponsor. On occasion, grants are made to organization with 501(c)(4) status.
When is the Deadline? Upcoming deadlines are June 15th, 2014 and October 15th, 2014. The application deadline for February 15th, 2014 has passed.
Something Cool or Unique About This Opportunity: The Foundation provides examples of grants for each of the funding strategies. This great resource can help you understand the types of programs that have been funded in the past. See some of the grant examples for Healthy Schools here.
Where Can I Get More Information: Visit the Grantmaking section of The Colorado Health Foundation website.
Featured Grant Opportunity: Ohio Straight A Fund Round 2
The Ohio Department of Education has released application documents for Round 2 of the Straight A Fund Grant Program. The Straight A Fund provides funding to educational entities in Ohio with the drive and courage to try new approaches that:
- Meet the learning needs of its students,
- Reduce the cost of running a school or school district, or
- Drive more dollars to the classroom.
We’re including some basic information on the grant below. For further details be sure to visit the Straight A Fund Program Website.
Program Overview: This is an exciting and unique opportunity because funds can go for virtually any school project that is sustainable and will increase achievement or the amount of resources devoted to the classroom! In the first round of funding, 24 grants representing over 150 school districts and partnering organizations were awarded $88.6 million dollars. Grants funded in the first round of awards included the following initiatives: plans to increase student access to high-tech manufacturing skills, expansion of post-secondary class offerings in Appalachia, expansion of the use of digital technology in classrooms, STEM-focused projects, and support for physical activity and nutrition programs, among others.
Award: Individual applicants can request up to $5 Million, and consortium applicants can request up to $15 Million.
A total of $250 Million was allocated to the Straight A Fund. About $11 Million was earmarked for a specific initiative. In the first round of the grants, $88.6 Million was awarded. Therefore, approximately $150 Million remains available for Round 2 awards. Awards are for Fiscal Year 15.
Who Can Apply: Schools in Ohio
When is the Deadline? The intent to apply period is open through March 7th, 2014. (The intent to apply is neither required nor binding.) Applications for the grant will be accepted from March 20th through April 3rd at 4 PM.
Tips for Proposals: Proposals that are creative and cost effective will have a higher chance at getting funding. The Straight A Fund states that they “are on the lookout for proposals that solve specific problems in our schools, can be quickly duplicated by others and are sustainable.”
The contacts stress that being clear in your application explanations is critical.
The impact of your project will be scored. Think about changes you can make that will make a large impact either because you will affect a lot of students (there were many multi-district winning projects in Round 1) or because you will make a huge change or both.
Something Cool or Unique About This Opportunity: Projects proposed for Straight A funding MUST be sustainable. In addition to providing thorough, detailed narrative explanations about sustainability, applicants must also complete a five-year Financial Impact Table that demonstrates the project can be sustained for at least five years beyond the grant period. Additionally, sustainability is not only scored, but there is an entire scoring round specific to rating sustainability. While you may propose a project that is expected to yield income, and you may discuss that income in your narrative, you may not count income as part of your sustainability plan due to the wording of the funding legislation. The project must be sustainable even without the anticipated income.
More Information/How to Apply: Access the Straight A Fund application here. Webinars aimed at helping potential applicants understand the rules and requirements of the program and application were scheduled for 2/11, 2/18, and 2/25/2014. If you weren’t able to attend a webinar that has already occurred, check out the links to the recorded events at the program’s site.
We’ll continue to add more featured grant opportunities to the Insight Blog. If you would like more information on Insight’s grant writing, editing, or research services, please contact us by phone at 716-474-0981, email info@insightgrants.com, or fill out our online contact form.
