Education Innovation and Research (EIR) Program - Expansion Grant

Overview

Purpose of Program: The EIR program, established under section 4611 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, as amended (ESEA), provides funding to create, develop, implement, replicate, or take to scale entrepreneurial, evidence-based, field-initiated innovations to improve student achievement and attainment for high need students and to rigorously evaluate such innovations. The EIR program is designed to generate and validate solutions to persistent education challenges and to support the expansion of those solutions to serve substantially more students.

The central design element of the EIR program is its multi-tier structure that links the amount of funding an applicant may receive to the quality of the evidence supporting the efficacy of the proposed project, with the expectation that projects that build this evidence will advance through EIR’s grant tiers: ‘‘Early-phase,’’ ‘‘Mid-phase,’’ and ‘‘Expansion.’’ ‘‘Early-phase,’’ ‘‘Mid-phase,’’ and ‘‘Expansion’’ grants differ in terms of the level of prior evidence of effectiveness required for consideration for funding, the expectations regarding the kind of evidence and information funded projects should produce, the level of scale funded projects should reach, and, consequently, the amount of funding available to support each type of project.

‘‘Expansion’’ grants differ in terms of the level of prior evidence of effectiveness required for consideration for funding, the expectations regarding the kind of evidence and information funded projects should produce, the level of scale funded projects should reach, and, consequently, the amount of funding available to support each type of project.

Expansion grants are supported by strong evidence for at least one population and setting, and grantees are encouraged to implement at the national level. Expansion grants provide funding for the implementation and rigorous evaluation of a program that has been found to produce sizable, significant impacts under a Mid-phase grant or other effort meeting similar criteria, for the purposes of (a) determining whether such impacts can be successfully reproduced and sustained over time; and (b) identifying the conditions in which the program is most effective.

Expansion projects are expected to scale practices that have prior evidence of effectiveness, in order to improve outcomes for high-need and underserved students. They are also expected to generate important information about an intervention’s effectiveness, such as for whom and in which contexts a practice is most effective, including cost-effectiveness. Expansion projects are uniquely positioned to help answer critical questions about the process of scaling a practice to the national level across geographies. Expansion grantees are encouraged to consider how the cost structure of a practice can change as the intervention scales. Additionally, grantees may want to consider how their project will balance implementation fidelity and flexibility for scaling. 

The FY 2023 Expansion grant competition includes two absolute priorities and one competitive preference priority. Applicants must address both Absolute priorities. Applicants have the option of addressing the competitive preference priority.

Absolute Priority 1 - Strong Evidence: Establishes the evidence requirement for this tier of grants. All Expansion applicants must submit prior evidence of effectiveness that meets the strong evidence standard.

Absolute Priority 2 - Field-Initiated Innovations - General: Allows applicants the option to propose projects that are field-initiated innovations to improve student achievement and attainment. 

Competitive Preference Priority - Promoting Equity in Student Access to Educational Resources and Opportunities: Implementers and Partners. Intended to encourage applicants to propose projects that involve (as applicants or partners) entities underrepresented in the program’s portfolio of grants.

• IHE can only apply in partnership with LEA, SEA, or BIE. 
• Under section 4611(d) of the ESEA, each grant recipient must provide, from Federal, State, local, or private sources, an amount equal to 10 percent of funds provided under the grant, which may be provided in cash or through in-kind contributions, to carry out activities supported by the grant.

• Estimated Number of Awards: 4 - 8. 
• The maximum award amount a grantee may receive under these three competitions (Expansion (84.411A), Mid-phase (84.411B), and Early-phase (84.411C), taken together, is $15,000,000.