The Promise Neighborhoods program aims to significantly improve the academic and developmental outcomes of children living in the most distressed communities of the United States, including ensuring school readiness, high school graduation, and access to a community-based continuum of high-quality services. The program serves neighborhoods with high concentrations of low-income individuals; multiple signs of distress, which may include high rates of poverty, childhood obesity, academic failure, and juvenile delinquency, adjudication, or incarceration; and schools implementing comprehensive support and improvement activities or targeted support and improvement activities. All strategies in the continuum of solutions must be accessible to children with disabilities and English learners.
The Promise Neighborhoods program works to improve the educational and developmental outcomes of children and youth in our most distressed communities and to transform those communities by:
- Identifying and increasing the capacity of eligible organizations that are focused on achieving results for children and youth throughout an entire neighborhood;
- Building a complete continuum of cradle-through-college-to-career solutions of both education programs and family and community supports, with great schools at the center. All strategies in the continuum of solutions must be accessible to children with disabilities and English learners;
- Integrating programs and breaking down agency silos so that solutions are implemented effectively and efficiently across agencies;
- Developing the local infrastructure of systems and resources needed to develop, implement, and sustain effective interventions to improve education outcomes and enhance family and community well-being across the broader region beyond the initial neighborhood; and
- Learning about the overall impact of the Promise Neighborhoods program and about the relationship between particular strategies in Promise Neighborhoods and student outcomes, including through an evaluation of the program, particular elements within the continuum of solutions, or both.
In FY2021, This competition includes three absolute priorities, four competitive preference priorities, and one invitational priority.
- Absolute Priority 1—Non-Rural and Non-Tribal Communities. To meet this priority, an applicant must propose to implement a PN strategy that serves one or more nonrural or non-Tribal communities.
- Absolute Priority 2—Rural Applicants. Under this priority, an applicant must demonstrate one or more of the following: (a) The applicant proposes to serve a local educational agency (LEA) that is eligible under the Small Rural School Achievement (SRSA) program or the Rural and Low-Income School (RLIS) program authorized under Title V, Part B of the ESEA. (b) The applicant proposes to serve a community that is served by one or more LEAs with a locale code of 32, 33, 41, 42, or 43. (c) The applicant proposes a project in which a majority of the schools served have a locale code of 32, 33, 41, 42, or (d) The applicant is an institution of higher education (IHE) with a rural campus setting, or the applicant proposes to serve a campus with a rural setting. Rural settings include any of the following: Town-Fringe, Town-Distant, Town-Remote, Rural Fringe, Rural- Distant, Rural-Remote, as defined by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) College Navigator search tool.
- Absolute Priority 3—Tribal Communities. To meet this priority, an applicant must propose to implement a PN strategy that serves one or more Indian Tribes (as defined in this notice).
- Competitive Preference Priority 1— Community-Level Opioid Abuse Prevention Efforts (0 to 3 points). To meet this priority, an applicant must: (1) Demonstrate how it will partner with an organization that conducts high-quality, community-level activities to prevent opioid abuse, such as an organization supported by an Office of National Drug Control Policy, Drug-Free Communities Support Program grant, in PN communities; (2) describe the partner organization's record of success in approaching opioid abuse prevention at the community level; and (3) provide, in its application, a memorandum of understanding between it and the partner organization responsible for managing the effort. The memorandum of understanding must indicate a commitment on the part of the applicant to coordinate implementation and align resources to the greatest extent practicable.
- Competitive Preference Priority 2— Spurring Investment in Qualified Opportunity Zones (0 to 3 points). Under this priority, an applicant must demonstrate that the area in which the applicant proposes to provide services overlaps with a Qualified Opportunity Zone (QOZ), as designated by the Secretary of the Treasury under section 1400Z–1 of the Internal Revenue Code. An applicant must— (1) Provide the census tract number of the QOZ(s) in which it proposes to provide services (1 point); and (2) Describe how the applicant will provide services in the QOZ(s) (Up to 2 points).
- Competitive Preference Priority 3— Applications from New Potential Grantees (0 or 1 point). Under this priority, an applicant must demonstrate that it has never received a grant, including through membership in a group application submitted in accordance with 34 CFR 75.127–75.129, under the program from which it seeks funds.
- Competitive Preference Priority 4— Evidence-Based Activities to Support Academic Achievement (0 to 3 points). Projects that propose to use evidence based (as defined in 34 CFR 77.1(c)) activities, strategies, or interventions that support teaching practices that will lead to increasing student achievement (as defined in this notice), graduation rates, and career readiness.
- Invitational Priority - Community-Based Crime Reduction Efforts. To meet this priority, an applicant must:
- Demonstrate how it will partner with an organization that conducts high-quality activities focused on the re-entry of formerly incarcerated individuals or on community-based crime reduction activities, such as an organization supported by a U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) Innovations in Community-Based Crime Reduction Program grant, a grant authorized under the Second Chance Act, as reauthorized under the Formerly Incarcerated Reenter Society Transformed Safely Transitioning Every Person (FIRST STEP) Act, or DOJ Office of Justice Programs competitive grants related to juvenile justice and delinquency prevention;
- describe the partner organization's record of success with supporting the re-entry of formerly incarcerated individuals or community based crime reduction and how their efforts will be coordinated with the PN activities of this grant; and
- provide, in its application, a memorandum of understanding between it and a partner organization managing the effort. The memorandum of understanding must indicate a commitment on the part of the applicant to coordinate implementation and align resources to the greatest extent practicable.
Within these funding priorities, applicants may also address the following competitive preference priorities:
- Byrne Criminal Justice Innovation (BCJI) Program. To meet this priority, an applicant must propose to serve geographic areas that were the subject of a targeted strategy addressing crime in a specific community pursuant to a BCJI grant awarded by the U.S. Department of Justice during FY 2012 or later years. To be eligible under this priority, the applicant must either:
- Drug Free Communities (DFC) Support Program. To receive points under this priority, the applicant must either:
- Demonstrate that it has received a DFC grant to prevent opioid abuse (as one of its areas of focus) (https://www.samhsa.gov/grants/grant-announcements-2016); or
- Provide, in its application, a memorandum of understanding between it and a partner that is a recipient of a DFC grant to address opioid abuse prevention as one of its areas of focus.
- Evidence-Based Activities, Strategies, or Interventions. To meet this priority, an applicant must propose to carry out evidence-based activities, strategies, or interventions that, based on information included in their application, are supported by promising evidence.
- Promise Zones. To meet this priority, an applicant must include a Certification of Consistency with Promise Zone Goals and Implementation (HUD Form 50153) signed by an authorized representative of the lead organization of a Promise Zone designated by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) or the United States Department of Agriculture. To view the list of designated Promise Zones and lead organizations please go to www.hud.gov/promisezones.