Grant Opportunities Available to Schools from the NEA Foundation
May 13, 2020
In response to educators’ emerging needs for addressing the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on teaching and learning, the National Education Association (NEA) Foundation is offering three new grant opportunities: COVID-19 Rapid Response Grant, COVID-19 Response Student Success Grant, and COVID-19 Response Learning & Leadership Grant.
A COVID-19 Rapid Response Grant will support school initiatives to address the unique challenges presented by COVID-19.
The grant application process, which opened on April 23, will close at 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time on Thursday, June 11. Applications will be reviewed on a biweekly basis:
• The first deadline for applications is May 14, and successful grantees will be notified of their status by June 1.
• The second deadline for applications is May 28, with notification to grantees occurring by June 15.
• The third deadline for applications is June 11, with status reports going out by June 29.
NEA officials anticipate that a maximum of $15,000 will be awarded in each of the first two rounds of funding, with up to $50,000 awarded in total over three rounds of grants.
Grants will be awarded based on the narrative describing the school’s efforts in dealing with COVID-19. NEA Foundation’s Rapid Response Funding is intended to support initiatives beginning this summer and include issues such as:
• Addressing the social and emotional needs of educators, students, and students’ families;
• Learning new pedagogy and/or adapting curricula to support distance/virtual learning and instruction;
• Addressing students’ summer learning loss;
• Preparing for the transition back to traditional schooling or adapting to continued virtual schooling;
• Supporting students’ and parents’/caregivers’ efforts to support their children’s learning (via virtual class instruction or summer enrichment activities); and
• Meeting the nutritional needs of students who rely on school meals and school-based summer feeding programs.
Preference with regards to a COVID-19 Rapid Response Grant will be given to educator-led initiatives which identify and note how their proposed project will address educational inequity and educational opportunity gaps.
Anyone seeking additional information or a grant application should visit the NEA Foundation website at https://www.neafoundation.org/for-educators/covid-rapid-response-grants/. This website provides the grant guidelines, criteria, and timelines not only for the COVID-19 Rapid Response Grant but for the COVID-19 Response Student Success Grant and the COVID-19 Response Learning and Leadership Grant.