Some Details on the Investing in Innovation Fund Grant Applications

Last week, school districts, non-profits, and consortia of schools submitted their applications for the federal Investing in Innovation (i3) grant program. i3 is a new $4.35 billion program created by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 that provides competitive grants to school districts, schools, and non-profits implementing successful innovative practices. As of Wednesday, May 12th, 1,669 applications had been submitted with more potentially coming in from applicants in the federally-declared disaster area in Tennessee. Though the Department of Education (ED) has not yet released details on these applications, we can draw some conclusions from the information organizations submitted to ED in early April on the types of programs they would be proposing for i3.

More than 2,400 school districts, consortia, or non-profits filed intents to apply with ED; the majority intended to propose development grants focusing on standards and assessments or low-performing schools. Additionally, most will focus on college access and success and students with special needs. A more detailed break-down is described below:

Of the organizations that submitted intents to apply, 68.1 percent intended to apply for development grants. Development grants provide up to $5 million to help implement promising, but relatively un-tested, strategies and programs on a limited scale. However, applicants must provide rationale for the program they have chosen based on past research or experience. In contrast, 21.6 percent of organizations filed their intent to submit validation grants, which can reach $30 million and require more concrete evidence of success. Finally, only 3.6 percent filed their intent to submit scale-up grants. Scale-up grants provide up to $50 million for programs or strategies with strong evidence of success that will be scaled to meet the needs of more students. The remaining 6.7 percent of filers did not specify the type of grant they would be submitting.

According to ED documentation, up to 100 development grants and 100 validation grants will be awarded under i3. Given the disproportionate number of potential development grant applications, the competition is sure to be stiff in that category. At the same time, the relatively small number of validation grants means that as many as one in five applicants could win a grant. On the other hand, only up to five scale-up grants are likely to be awarded, meaning that quite a few strong programs will be disappointed.

Potential applicants also had to indicate which area of “absolute priority” their grant application would fall under. ED selected four education policy areas of focus for the i3 grants and each proposed grant must fall under one of them. More than 30 percent of filers announced their intent to apply under the standards and assessments priority. These grants will support strategies to help underserved students succeed in rigorous courses, improve the quality of assessments, and better translate standards into classroom practices. Twenty-six percent of filers submitted their intent to apply under the low-performing schools priority. These grants will support practices to help improve struggling schools. Of the remaining filers, 20.1 percent submitted their intent to apply under the teacher and principal effectiveness priority and 13.2 percent submitted their intent to submit applications under the improved use of data systems priority. Finally, 10.2 percent of filers did not declare an absolute priority.

Finally, filers had to declare any competitive preference priorities that would be addressed in their grant applications (filers could declare more than one priority or none at all). More than half – 56.6 percent – of filers intended to submit applications under the college access and success preference, meaning that their grant proposal would support efforts to improve the access and success of underserved students in college. Forty-nine percent of potential applicants filed under the students with disabilities and limited English proficient priority and 40.7 percent filed under the rural local education agency priority. However, only 28.0 percent filed under the early learning priority and 3.4 percent did not file under any priority.

Unsurprisingly, large numbers of potential applicants filed from large states like Texas, California, and New York. California had the most with 341, while New York had 149, and Texas had 128. However, some smaller states had impressive numbers of filers. For example, 64 potential applicants filed from the District of Columbia, more than 39 other states including Wisconsin and New Jersey. This unusually high number of potential applicants (DC has the fewest students in the nation) could be an indicator of the active reform landscape in DC. North Dakota had the lowest number of potential applicants at 2, and Wyoming only had 3.

Obviously, these aren’t the final statistics for the actual i3 applications. The Department received nearly 800 fewer applications than it expected based on the filed intents to apply. However, 1,669 applications is nothing to scoff at – the i3 reviewers certainly have their work cut out for them.