Office of Innovation and Improvement (OII): Education Innovation and Research Program: Mid-phase Grants CFDA Number 84.411B | ED GRANTS 041918 002

Opportunity Information: Apply for ED GRANTS 041918 002

The Office of Innovation and Improvement (OII) Education Innovation and Research (EIR) Program Mid-phase Grants (CFDA 84.411B) is a U.S. Department of Education discretionary grant competition designed to support evidence-based education innovations that improve student achievement and attainment for high-need students. Authorized under section 4611 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), the EIR program focuses on helping practitioners and organizations develop, validate, and expand promising approaches to persistent educational challenges, while requiring rigorous, independent evaluation so the field learns what works, for whom, and under what conditions.

A defining feature of EIR is its tiered evidence model, which links award size and expectations to the strength of evidence behind the proposed intervention. Across the broader EIR program, applicants may pursue Early-phase, Mid-phase, or Expansion grants, with each tier reflecting a step in the pipeline from initial innovation to broad scaling. Early-phase awards generally support new or less-proven practices with limited evidence, while Expansion awards support scaling interventions backed by the strongest forms of prior evidence. This specific opportunity, however, invites applications only for Mid-phase grants, which sit in the middle of that pipeline and are meant to take interventions that already show promise and test them more rigorously while expanding their reach.

Mid-phase grants are intended to fund the implementation and rigorous evaluation of a program that has already been implemented successfully, either under an EIR Early-phase grant or through another comparable effort. To be competitive at this tier, the proposed project must be supported by at least moderate evidence of effectiveness (as defined in the official notice) for at least one population or setting. The Department encourages Mid-phase projects to operate at a larger scale than typical pilots, ideally at a regional or even national level, so the intervention can be examined across broader, real-world contexts and with substantially more students than in early development work.

A major emphasis of the Mid-phase tier is building the knowledge base through evaluation that is strong enough to inform decisions about replication and scaling. Applicants are encouraged to design evaluations that could meet the strong evidence threshold, meaning the evaluation design should be as rigorous as feasible (often aiming toward experimental or similarly robust approaches). Beyond measuring impacts on student outcomes, Mid-phase projects are expected to examine questions about variation in effectiveness, such as which student groups benefit most, which settings support stronger implementation, and which contextual factors influence results.

Cost-effectiveness is also a central expectation. The Department signals that grantees should measure the cost-effectiveness of their practices, ideally leveraging existing administrative data or other readily available sources to make the analysis more feasible and sustainable. This focus is meant to help schools, districts, and other adopters understand not only whether an intervention works, but whether it delivers results in a way that is financially realistic to maintain after federal funding ends.

To support replication by others, Mid-phase evaluations are expected to identify and codify the core components of the funded practice. In practical terms, this means documenting what the intervention is, what elements are essential versus adaptable, and how implementation fidelity is maintained as the program expands into new sites. If the Mid-phase project includes new populations or new settings beyond where the program was previously tested, the evaluation should explicitly examine effectiveness for those new contexts as well.

The Department also indicates it intends to provide evaluation technical assistance to grantees and their independent evaluators. This may include requiring updated, comprehensive evaluation plans in specified formats and encouraging annual updates to reflect changes while staying aligned with the approved scope and objectives. The broader intent is to ensure that evaluations are well-designed, consistently documented, and useful to both the grantee and the field.

In terms of applicant eligibility, the opportunity is open to a wide range of entities, including state, county, and local governments; independent school districts; special district governments; public and private institutions of higher education; nonprofit organizations (including both 501(c)(3) and non-501(c)(3) entities other than IHEs); for-profit organizations (including small businesses); and other eligible applicants as clarified in the official notice. This wide eligibility reflects EIRs goal of encouraging field-initiated solutions from multiple sectors, as long as the project is evidence-based, focused on improving outcomes for high-need students, and designed for rigorous evaluation.

Key competition details listed in the synopsis include an application availability date of April 23, 2018, a strongly encouraged (but not required) notice of intent to apply deadline of May 9, 2018 submitted via an online form, and an application transmittal deadline of June 5, 2018. The expected number of awards is 10, with an award ceiling of $8,000,000 per grant. The funding opportunity number is ED-GRANTS-041918-002, and the administering agency is the Department of Education.

Finally, the synopsis repeatedly emphasizes that the controlling guidance is the official Federal Register application notice, along with the Department of Education Common Instructions for Applicants to Discretionary Grant Programs (referenced as published February 12, 2018). Those official documents govern the exact requirements for priorities, application content and submission procedures, performance measures, program contacts, and the formal definitions of evidence levels and evaluation standards that Mid-phase applicants must meet.

• The Department of Education in the education sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Office of Innovation and Improvement (OII): Education Innovation and Research Program: Mid-phase Grants CFDA Number 84.411B" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 84.411.
• This funding opportunity was created on Apr 19, 2018.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Jun 05, 2018 Applications Available April 23, 2018. Deadline for Notice of Intent To Apply May 9, 2018. Notice of Intent to Apply We will be able to develop a more efficient process for reviewing grant applications if we know the approximate number of applicants that intend to apply for funding under this competition. Therefore, the Secretary strongly encourages each potential applicant to notify us of the applicantaposs intent to submit an application by completing a web-based form. When completing this form, applicants will provide (1) the applicant organizationaposs name and address and (2) the absolute priority the applicant intends to address. Applicants may access this form online at www.surveymonkey.com/r/PBVB8PJ. Applicants that do not complete this form may still submit an application. Deadline for Transmittal of Applications June 5, 2018.. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $8,000,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 10 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: State governments, County governments, City or township governments, Special district governments, Independent school districts, Public and State controlled institutions of higher education, Nonprofits having a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Nonprofits that do not have a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Private institutions of higher education, For profit organizations other than small businesses, Small businesses, Others (see text field entitled Additional Information on Eligibility for clarification).

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