With summer over, and school back in session, you may be planning in earnest for an NSF education proposal submission. Deadlines for the Advancing Informal Science Learning (AISL) and Discovery Research PreK-12 (DRK-12) are November 6th and 18th. Rockman staff have years of experience serving on NSF review panels, and writing evaluations for over 50 funded NSF proposals over the last ten years. Last year, we shared four tried-and-true proposal tips. This year, we’re pleased to share four more.
- Find your fit! Identify the type of funding that’s right for you. NSF supports multiple types of projects for different strands of formal and informal education research and development. Review the Requests for Proposals carefully, and search NSF’s database of recently funded projects to determine where your ideas best belong. Contact a program officer for further assistance.
Hot Tip: If you’re submitting an AISL proposal, take advantage of virtual office hours on October 10th and 16th. Visit NSF’s website for more information.
- Engage your research and third-party evaluation partners early in your proposal planning process. Don’t wait until you have a perfectly formed idea or near-final proposal draft before lining up your partners. Research partners and third-party evaluators can provide feedback on the aspects of your work that are ripest for further development. They can also help you articulate the intellectual merit and broader impact of your work. Engaging your partners early enables them to develop robust research and evaluation plans that can inform your project’s design, demonstrate impact, and generate knowledge for the field.
We recommend securing your research and evaluation partners at least three to four weeks before your grant deadline. It’s helpful if you’ve put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) and written down some thoughts about your goals for the project, proposed activities, and general timeline. This can take the form of a short paragraph or a full draft of the proposal for your partner to review.
Hot Tip: Rockman et al does research and evaluation. You can contact us for either service.
- Broaden your thinking around broader impact. Lately, we’ve noticed that proposal reviewers have been more sensitive to evidence of broader impact in project development and dissemination. They want to see that proposers are explicitly engaging communities that have been traditionally underrepresented in science, and look for letters of commitment from community partners. They also want dissemination that reaches broader audiences.
Consider sharing what you’ve developed at practitioner conferences, community events (e.g., science festivals), or culminating events with stakeholders (e.g., townhall event). Publish with your community and teaching partners in practitioner journals. Share your work in open access academic journals, and allocate money in your budget to do so. The Journal of STEM Outreach, started in 2018, is one such option. Rockman researcher, Kristin Bass, is one of the journal’s associate editors, and can vouch that it is always seeking new manuscripts.
Hot Tip: Your third-party evaluator can assess the broader impact of your project. For example, if you’re creating a series of videos for your project, one metric of success is the number of video viewers you’re reaching. Another way to gauge broader impact is to explore reactions to that media by your target audience(s) via a focus group discussion facilitated by your third-party evaluator. Think creatively about how to use your evaluators’ expertise!
- Take full advantage of NSF resource centers, including those not affiliated with your particular program. NSF funds resource centers to support proposals and projects, build communities of practice, and disseminate research. Look at these pages for webinar recordings, proposal tips, and other resources. Many of these resources are not necessarily solicitation-specific. Looking at several sites may give you ideas for strengthening your submission.
- Center for Advancing Informal Science Education (CAISE)’s AISL Proposal Page
- Community for Advancing Discovery Research in Education (CADRE)’s NSF DRK-12 Proposal Toolkit
- STEM Learning and Research Center (STELAR)’s ITEST Proposal Development Resources
- Center for Innovative Resources in Cyberlearning (CIRCL)’s Cyberlearning Proposal Resources
- ATECentral’s Advanced Technological Education Grant Proposal Preparation Resources
Good luck to all those working on NSF proposals this fall! If you have not yet secured a third-party evaluator or research partner, it’s not too late. Contact us today to discuss your proposed project. We’d love to work with you to develop a strong proposal.