FY 2016 FEMA Assistance to Firefighters Grant Application Period Opening Soon
FEMA sent out an email this past Friday, 9/2/2016, indicating the next application period for Assistance to Firefighters Grants will open in about a month on Tuesday, 10/11/2016. Applications will be due Friday, 11/18/2016 at 5pm ET. Applicants are advised to begin preparing to apply ASAP and can do so using several tools provided by FEMA which are available now and accessible here, including:
- FY 2016 Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO)
- FY 2016 AFG Grant Application Get Ready Guide
- FY 2016 AFG Narrative Get Ready Guide
- FY 2016 AFG Self-Evaluation – Operations and Safety
- FY 2016 AFG Self-Evaluation – Vehicle Acquisition
- FY 2016 AFG Application Checklist
- FY 2016 AFG Cost Share Calculator
For the latest information on the Assistance to Firefighters program and all of the details, visit the official program site.
2016 PEP Grant Application Period Now Open
The application period for the Carol M. White Physical Education Program grants, or PEP grants, opened today. Applications are due 5/20/2016. You can access the application package and instructions via grants.gov here. Click on the Funding Opportunity Number (ED-GRANTS-032116-001) to go to the grant summary page. Then click on the “Package” tab to download the grants.gov package and the RFP. You can also access the RFP directly by clicking here. Good luck!
-Rosalie
2016 Carol M. White PEP grants due 5/20/2016!
Although the docket indicated Monday, the Federal Register Notice for the 2016 Carol M. White Physical Education Program (PEP) grant competition was published very early this morning. The Notice shows the application will be available/application period will open Monday, 3/21/2016. The deadline for all applications is 4:30 pm Washington DC time on 5/20/2016.
Grants.gov submission is required. If you’d like to apply and your organization does not already have an active grants.gov account with an approved AOR Role, go to grants.gov to establish (or reactivate) an account as soon as possible beginning on Monday. (The system is down this weekend for maintenance.) Grants.gov account establishment requires your organization to have an active sam.gov account first. If this is your organization’s first time establishing a grants.gov account, and/or if your organization’s sam.gov account is expired, you will need a high-level administrator to work on the sam.gov account. Note that the US Department of Education (ED) has done a really nice of job of including detailed information about grants.gov this year in the PEP grant Federal Register Notice. Use that resource as well as the information available on the grants.gov and sam.gov sites and their respective helpdesks. Establishment of these accounts can take a few minutes or a more than a month depending on your organization’s situation. Begin work preparing your accounts ASAP to ensure they are ready well in advance of when you need to submit the grant. Extensions are not granted for organizations that miss the deadline because their accounts are not ready to submit in time.
Good luck!
-Rosalie
Carol M. White PEP grant competition opens Monday, 3/21/2016!
The Federal Register Notice that will officially open the 2016 PEP grant competition will be posted MONDAY, 3/21/2016. This is very likely to be the final PEP grant competition ever, so this is particularly exciting.
The grant deadline will be 60 days from the Notice publication date and will be listed in the final publication on Monday.
The full RFP may be available Monday, or it may take a few days. The release is not always immediate. Grants.gov submission is required, and the grants.gov application package will be available for download by Tuesday.
A few quick notes:
- Recommended award range is now $200,000 – $800,000 per year, with average size expected to be $500,000 per year.
- Total amount available for new awards is $23 Million.
- Awards are still for 1, 2, or 3 years. Forward funding will apply as anticipated. This means funds for all years of each awardee’s grant will come out of this year’s $23 Million since this is the last year of funding.
- Anticipated number of awards is 15—this could go up or down some depending on the size of the requests of the applicants chosen for awards.
- There are three opportunities for bonus points via Competitive Preference Priorities. The first involves partnerships. The other two are related to student achievement.
- There is an Invitational Priority (not required and not attached to any additional points) for discussion of Evidence of Promise–research showing program elements are proven to work.
If you’d like assistance, please contact us today. Good luck to all applying!
2016 Carol M. White PEP grants coming soon!
The Carol M. White Physical Education Program–also know as the PEP grant–will be holding what is almost certain to be its last competition this spring. This is because the new Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), which goes into effect in 2017, did not include PEP as an authorized program. Congress did, however, appropriate $47 Million to PEP for 2016, and PEP is still authorized for this year. Insight was able to confirm with US ED PEP Program Manager Carlette KyserPegram a little over a month ago that US ED does plan to hold a PEP grant competition in 2016.
For months now the US Department of Education’s Forecast of Funding Opportunities has indicated PEP may open on or around 3/15/2016 with applications due on or around 5/13/2016. While those dates could change at any time, and we won’t know for certain when the application period will be until the actual RFP is released, this information suggests the application period could open as soon as this coming Tuesday. Therefore, organizations interested in applying should begin preparing immediately, if they aren’t already doing so.
PEP is always very competitive, with just 5-18% of applicants nationwide receiving awards depending on the competition year. Here are a few reasons why PEP is expected to be even more competitive than usual in 2016:
- Due to PEP not being included as an authorized program under ESSA, 2016 will almost certainly be the last time ever that PEP will be funded. Many districts will be looking to apply this year since it will be their last chance.
- Since PEP cannot receive funding after 2016, US ED was considering applying a forward funding approach to this year’s awards. If that happens, that would mean that the applicants selected through the competition would have all of their grant years funded out of the 2016 appropriation, rather than just the first year which is the usual approach. This means each award would cost the 2016 PEP appropriation the full project period cost rather than the just the first year cost. Ultimately, this would mean fewer total awards could be made.
- Fewer funds are available in total than in previous years because the Congressional appropriation was lower than in most PEP years at $47 Million total compared to the $70-80 Million total for most of the program’s past years.
- The last PEP competition was held 3 years ago in 2013. The last set of new awards were made 2 years ago in 2014, but only high-scoring but non-winning applicants from the 2013 were eligible for consideration. Many districts have literally waited years for a chance to apply, and some of them have been preparing for most of that time.
Preparation will be critical to applications being highly competitive!
If you’re not too familiar with PEP, here are the basics:
PEP exists to support physical activity and nutrition education programs that help K-12 students meet or exceed state PE standards.
As of the most recently concluded competition, PEP grants could be 1, 2, or 3 years in length with award sizes of up to $750,000 per year. Matching is required at 10% of the total project cost in Year 1, and 25% of the total project cost per year in Years 2 and 3. Matching may be inkind and/or cash. PEP grants must adhere to a supplement not supplant rule.
Will your district be applying for PEP this year? Don’t miss out! For 16 years, PEP has been the biggest and best-fit funding source for PE, physical activity, and nutrition programming for schools and community-based organizations serving school-age kids. While the competition will be tough, this year’s competition is your “last chance” opportunity to obtain a PEP grant. So start preparing now to submit a stellar application.
If you’re interested in grant writing or editing-only assistance, please contact us. Insight has a strong track record with PEP. The Insight Team includes several writers who have each won many PEP grants over the years. I myself have written 24 and edited an additional 46 winning PEP grants (70 total) for districts around the country.
Good luck!
-Rosalie Mangino-Crandall
