sga-dfa-py-10-03.pdf

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR

Employment and Training Administration Notice of Availability of Funds and Solicitation for Grant Applications for Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training Grants Program

AGENCY: Employment and Training Administration, U.S. Department of Labor

ANNOUNCEMENT TYPE: Notice of Solicitation for Grant Applications (SGA) Funding Opportunity Number: SGA/DFA PY 10-03 Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance Number: 17.282

KEY DATES: The closing date for receipt of applications under this announcement is April 21, 2011.

APPLICATIONS MUST BE RECEIVED NO LATER THAN 4 p.m. Eastern Time. A pre-recorded webinar will be on-line (http://www.workforce3one.org) and accessible for viewing on January 24, 2011 at 1:00 p.m. Eastern Time, and will be available for viewing anytime after that date. While a review of this webinar is encouraged it is not mandatory that applicants view this recording.

Applicants are also encouraged to view the online tutorial, “Grant Applications 101: A Plain English Guide to ETA Competitive Grants,” available through Workforce3One at:

http://www.workforce3one.org/page/grants_toolkit.

SUMMARY: The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL or the Department) announces the availability of up to $500 million in grant funds to be awarded under the Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training grants program (TAACCCT). These funds are available to eligible institutions of higher education to serve workers who are eligible for training under the TAA for workers program in the 50 States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. The TAACCCT provides community colleges and other eligible institutions of higher education with funds to expand and improve their ability to deliver education and career training programs that can be completed in two years or less, are suited for workers who are eligible for training under the Trade Adjustment Assistance for Workers program, and prepare program participants for employment in high-wage, high-skill occupations. The targeted population of this program is workers who have lost their jobs or are threatened with job loss as a result of foreign trade. The Department intends to fund multi-year grants to eligible institutions for either developing innovative programs or replicating evidence-based strategies. As a result of this Solicitation for Grant Applications (SGA), the Department is helping to ensure that our nation’s institutions of higher education are able to help the targeted population succeed in acquiring the skills, degrees, and credentials needed for high-wage, high-skill employment while also meeting the needs of employers for skilled workers.

In accordance with requirements of the TAACCCT, the Department intends to award at least 0.5 percent of the total amount of available funds to eligible institutions in each State, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. The eligible applicants for this SGA are institutions of higher education and consortia of two or more of those eligible institutions. The Department intends to fund grants ranging from $2.5 million to $5 million for individual applicants and from $2.5 million to $20 million for consortium applicants. Grants may exceed the award amount ceiling on two conditions only:

Individual or consortium applicants propose to replicate, at multiple sites and/or with the targeted and other populations, strategies that have been shown by prior research to have strong or moderate evidence of positive impacts on education and/or employment outcomes. See Attachment F for more information on the Evidence-Based Conceptual Framework; or

Individual or consortium applicants propose to develop and implement online and technology-enabled courses and learning projects that will be taken to scale beyond the community level to reach significant numbers of diverse students over a large geographic area.

ADDRESSES: Mailed applications must be addressed to the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration, Division of Federal Assistance, Attention: Donna Kelly, Grant Officer, Reference SGA/DFA PY 10-03, 200 Constitution Avenue, NW, Room N-4716, Washington, DC 20210. For complete “Application and Submission Information,” please refer to Section IV.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: This solicitation consists of nine (9) sections:

Section I provides a description of this funding opportunity.

A. Overview of the Grant Program B. Funding Priorities C. Allowable Activities D. Sustainability E. Targeted Population F. Required Community Outreach for Needs Assessment and Project Planning

Section II provides award information.

A. Award Amount B. Period of Performance

Section III provides eligibility information.

A. Eligible Institutions B. Consortium Applicants C. Additional Eligibility Information D. Leveraged Expertise E. Involvement of Employers and the Public Workforce System F. Cost Sharing G. Other Grant Specifications

Section IV provides information on the application and submission process.

A. How to Obtain an Application Package B. Content and Form of Application Submission C. Submission Date, Times, Process and Addresses D. Intergovernmental Review E. Funding Restrictions F. Other Submission Requirements

Section V describes the criteria against which applications will be reviewed and explains the proposal review process.

A. Evaluation Criteria B. Evaluation of Supplementary Materials for Applications Requesting Funds Above

Award Amount Ceiling C. Review and Selection Process

Section VI describes award administration information.

A. Award Notices B. Administrative and National Policy Requirements C. Reporting

Section VII provides agency contacts.

Section VIII provides additional resources of interest to applicants.

A. Web-Based Resources B. Industry Competency Models and Career Clusters C. Annotated Bibliography

Section IX provides other information.

I. Funding Opportunity Description A. Overview of the Grant Program

In an increasingly competitive world economy, America’s economic strength depends upon the education and skills of its workers. In the coming years, jobs requiring at least an associate’s degree are projected to grow twice as fast as those requiring no college experience. The nation needs workers with the education and skills to succeed in growing, high-wage occupations, and community colleges serve as significant and rapidly growing contributors to the nation’s higher education system, enrolling more than 11.8 million students. Community colleges work with business, labor, and government in their communities to create tailored education and training programs to meet employers’ needs and give students the skills required to obtain good jobs, earn family-sustaining wages, and advance along a career pathway.

The college graduation goals set by President Barack Obama and the need to increase the number of workers who attain degrees, certificates, and other industry-recognized credentials are addressed by the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010 (Reconciliation Act), Public Law No. 111-152, 19 USC 2372 – 2372a, which appropriated $2 billion for Fiscal Years (FY) 2011 – 2014 ($500 million annually) for the TAACCCT. The TAACCCT provides eligible institutions of higher education with funds to expand and improve their ability to deliver education and career training programs that can be completed in 2 years or less, and that result in skills, degrees, and credentials that prepare program participants for employment in high-wage, high-skill occupations, and are suited for workers who are eligible for training under the TAA for Workers program, chapter 2 of title II of the Trade Act of 1974 (19 USC 2271 et seq.). The Department expects that successful applicants will propose projects that expand and improve their ability to deliver education and training programs and achieve improved education and employment outcomes, rather than simply offering their existing courses to more workers and other students.

The Department is implementing this program in partnership with the Department of Education.

The TAACCCT is one of several new Federal grant programs in which grantor agencies fund projects that seek to use evidence to design program strategies.1 These initiatives fund the development of innovative programs or replication of evidence-based strategies and award grants to eligible institutions that are committed to using data to continuously evaluate the effectiveness of their strategies in order to improve their programming. The Department is committed to funding programs that are likely to improve education and employment outcomes for program participants while providing grantees the flexibility to identify and integrate effective strategies in their education and training programs and adjust or improve weaker strategies. The Department believes community colleges are an ideal place to apply this new approach, because they have been leaders in seeking out strategies that get results. Community colleges have innovated in many ways, crossing traditional boundaries to collaborate with employers, the public workforce system, Registered Apprenticeship programs, and other service organizations; and have continuously adapted their programs to respond to local economic needs and produce better outcomes for their students.

As the research on community college practices is currently limited, the Department anticipates that grants awarded in the TAACCT program will chiefly support the development of innovative program models that can be evaluated. For all funded projects, the TAACCCT will support institutions that are committed to using data to continuously assess the effectiveness of their strategies in order to improve their programming, and structuring programs to facilitate evaluation that can build evidence about effective practices. One outcome of the initiative will be to

1 For the purposes of this solicitation, the standards of evidence are described as follows: (1) strong - the evidence includes a study or multiple studies whose designs can support strong causal conclusions and studies which demonstrate the strategy to be effective with multiple populations and/ or in multiple sites; (2) moderate - evidence from a study or studies that include multiple sites and/ or populations that support weaker causal conclusions or that support strong causal conclusions that are not yet generalizable; and (3) preliminary - conclusions are based on research findings or reasonable hypotheses, including related research or theories of change in education, training, and other sectors. See Attachment F for more information on standards of evidence.

build knowledge about effective practices so that, in the future, institutions can replicate practices that are effective and identify and strengthen practices in need of improvement.

DOL is also interested in supporting consortia of two or more eligible institutions that will work together to take a broad view across an entire community, region, State, industry sector or cluster of related industries, and leverage their collective experience to expand and improve their ability to deliver education and career training programs. This may include developing and sharing courses that are affordable, offered during the day, at night, on weekends and virtually, and provide more workers with academic and industry-recognized credentials and meet the needs of more employers for skilled workers in the communities represented by the consortium. The Department encourages consortia to share resources in order to provide more cost-effective education and training programs.

Furthermore, the Department is interested in accessible online learning strategies that can effectively serve the targeted population. Online learning strategies can allow adults who are struggling to balance the competing demands of work and family to acquire new skills at a time, place and pace that are convenient for them. For example, these strategies can improve access to quality education for targeted workers and other students in underserved areas and have the potential to help workers who are eligible for training under the TAA for Workers program (the “targeted students” or “targeted population”) learn more in less time than they would with traditional classroom instruction alone. Interactive software can tailor instruction and tutoring to individual students, while simulations and multimedia software offer experiential learning. With the creation of new online, open-source courses that can ultimately be shared and distributed nationwide, community colleges and other eligible institutions across the country can offer more classes without building more classrooms. New online courses can create new routes for workers and other students to gain knowledge, skills and credentials, and earn academic credit based upon achievement rather than class hours, all while providing continuous feedback to students and instructors.

Finally, the Department will ensure that deliverables resulting from projects developed with these funds are available publicly, and that the aggregate data used to analyze the impact of the programs are available to the public. This means that curricula, course materials, teacher guides, and other products developed with grant funds will be considered grant deliverables and provided to the Department before completion of the grant period of performance with the appropriate licenses. Applicants should note this grant program has specific intellectual property and licensing requirements, which are defined in Section IV.E.4. Applicants should also note that before submitting grant deliverables to the Department, grantees will be required to submit the deliverables for independent review by subject matter experts, as described in Section III.G.5.

B. Funding Priorities

The grants awarded under this Solicitation will help eligible institutions expand and improve their ability to deliver education and career training programs that can be completed in two years or less, and are suited for workers who are eligible for training under the TAA for Workers program.

The Department is committed to funding applications that use data and evidence to demonstrate that strategies are likely to produce significant positive change and advance learning, allowing grantees to identify and integrate promising and proven strategies into their education and training programs. This program is designed to ensure that all eventual grant winners will contribute to strengthening the evidence base that exists on the impact of education and career training programs.

All successful applicants will be required to allow broad access for others to use and enhance project products and offerings, including permitting for-profit derivative uses of the courses and associated learning materials. See Section IV.E.4 for more information on Intellectual Property Rights.

All successful applicants that propose online and technology-enabled learning projects will develop materials in compliance with SCORM, as referenced in Section I.B.4 of this SGA. These courses and materials will be made available to the Department for free public use and distribution, including the ability to re-use course modules, via an online repository for learning materials to be established by the Federal Government. All grant products will be provided to the Department with meta-data (as described in Section III.G.4) in an open format mutually agreed-upon by the grantee and the Department.

Each proposed strategy should include an ongoing evaluation to ensure continuous improvement and data-based decision making.

The overarching goals of this SGA are to increase attainment of degrees, certificates, and other industry-recognized credentials and better prepare the targeted population, and other beneficiaries, for high-wage, high-skill employment. This SGA contains four priorities and corresponding strategies toward achievement of these goals:

1. Accelerate Progress for Low-Skilled and Other Workers;

2. Improve Retention and Achievement Rates to Reduce Time to Completion;

3. Build Programs That Meet Industry Needs, Including Developing Career Pathways; and

4. Strengthen Online and Technology-Enabled Learning.

The first three priorities are education and workforce development approaches and the last priority, strengthening online learning, is a delivery mechanism that may be used in any of the priorities outlined above and should be integrated into projects as appropriate to support their implementation. In order to be considered for funding under this Solicitation, applicants must focus on one or more of these four priorities and must propose a set of evidence-based strategies designed to address the needs of the targeted population.

The following discussion provides a set of strategies that correspond to each priority, and includes selected study citations that demonstrate the type of evidence that applicants should consider when developing their program designs. The Department recognizes there is limited research in the field of higher education and workforce development, so many of these strategies are only supported by preliminary evidence, or moderate evidence that shows mixed results.

Please note the lists of strategies associated with each of the four priority areas are not all-inclusive and applicants may identify other strategies as appropriate as long as these strategies align with the priority areas and are either evidence-based or supported by research findings or reasonable hypotheses. Please note, applicants may implement multiple strategies across different programs, course offerings, or curricula. Please refer to Appendix D for an Annotated Bibliography that contains more information on the research references in this section.

1. Accelerate Progress for Low-Skilled and Other Workers: DOL is interested in applications that increase success rates for students with basic skills deficiencies by redesigning developmental education, mitigating the need for developmental courses, and/or improving student services that improve retention (please note the limitations on the use of funds for supportive services established in Section IV.E.6 of this SGA). For the purpose of this solicitation, retention (or persistence) means the percentage of degree and credential-seeking students who entered the program in the previous year and are enrolled in the current year in the same program. Strategies for Priority 1 include, but are not limited to:

Developing and implementing contextualized learning that combines basic skills with specific career knowledge. For example, several community colleges in Washington State use a model which simultaneously teaches basic skills and career-specific technical skills in the same class. An evaluation found students using this model had better rates of completion and persistence than a comparison group (Jenkins 2009).

Improving student services, such as career counseling, tutoring, and job placement services. An ongoing random-assignment demonstration project is showing that enhanced student services (more frequent and/or intensive counseling) result in increased persistence in the short-term, although there was no significant impact in the latter part of the three-year follow-up period (Scrivener 2009).

Improving developmental education to better meet the needs of those students in the targeted population and other students with basic skills deficiencies, which will include pre-assessment upon entry to the program to identify basic skills levels for appropriate placement and post-assessment upon course completion to measure progress toward basic skills attainment. For example, most community colleges and adult education programs use assessment and placement tests prior to enrolling students in developmental education and career technical programs. There is little evidence that demonstrates a causal link between specific developmental education strategies and improved student outcomes (Bailey 2008). However, a few qualitative or correlational studies suggest a benefit from redesigning courses for underprepared students. For example, a quasi-experimental study that examined the outcomes of redesigned math courses at a university to allow underprepared students to take for-credit math without a non-credit developmental course prerequisite, demonstrated similar pass rates as regular courses that taught comparable material (Lucas 2007).

Enhancing relationships with community-based organizations and/or other appropriate entities that serve or represent segments of the diverse targeted population (men, women, racial and ethnic minorities, people with disabilities, veterans, etc.) to conduct outreach about training opportunities and meet the needs of diverse workers while they are in training through appropriate supportive services such as mentoring, childcare, and transportation assistance.

2. Improve Retention and Achievement Rates and/or Reduce Time to Completion: DOL is interested in applications that strengthen education and training courses, and use innovative techniques in course sequencing, scheduling, and delivery to reduce barriers to enrollment, increase success rates, and reduce the time it takes to obtain degrees, certificates, and other industry-recognized credentials. For applicants that currently have disparities in retention or graduation rates by race/ethnicity, gender, or disability, strategies should include plans to address those disparities as part of the grant activities. Strategies for Priority 2 include, but are not limited to:

Implementing self-paced learning strategies, block scheduling, and/or modular curriculum to reduce the time it takes to obtain degrees, certificates, and other industry-recognized credentials. For example, a 2009 report evaluating a university model that includes enhanced student supportive services and block scheduling used comparison group matching methodology to show that the intervention is two and a half times more likely to graduate a student in 2 years (Linderman 2009).

Developing an articulation process or agreement that grants academic credit for participants’ coursework (credit and non-credit), prior work experience, internships, and/or Registered Apprenticeships, and enabling transfer of credits to four-year institutions to encourage participants to advance to more education and training.

Implementing curricular and instructional innovations, such as “learning communities.”

A learning community requires students to take blocks of classes with the same group of peers to help students navigate through the college experience. The most rigorous evaluations of learning communities are mixed and the Department is interested in more information in these areas. A randomized study of the 2-year effects of a freshman learning community program at a community college in Brooklyn, New York, found short-term positive impacts on the number of credits earned, but mixed results on persistence (Scrivener 2008). However, a newer randomized study at a learning communities program at a community college in Florida found no impacts on student outcomes (Weiss 2010). A less rigorous 1997 comparison group study of learning communities at a Seattle community college found increased probability of quarter-to-quarter persistence (Tinto 1997).

Restructuring course scheduling at convenient times and locations to support attainment of degrees, certificates, and other industry-recognized credentials by the targeted population.

3. Build Programs That Meet Industry Needs, Including Developing Career Pathways:

DOL is interested in applications that expand and improve education and training programs to ensure relevance to area workforce needs, offer credit for both academic and occupational training, integrate industry-driven competencies, and result in degrees, certificates, and other industry-recognized credentials that are portable, stackable, and support placement into employment in a career pathway and/or further education. Strategies for Priority 3 include, but are not limited to:

Implementing earn and learn education models, such as on-the-job training, clinical or cooperative education, paid internships, and/or Registered Apprenticeships that offer opportunities for both academic and occupational certificates and credentials. A study of all workforce development programs in Washington State estimated their longer-term net impact by using non-experimental statistical methods to compare exiters from Registered Apprenticeship programs to exiters from the State’s labor exchange program. The study estimated that 9 to 12 quarters after exit, apprenticeship participants earned roughly $2,000 more per quarter than the comparison group. This was greater than the estimated net impact for community college programs (Hollenbeck 2006).

Developing partnerships with employers that may include validation of curricula, use of equipment and facilities, and/or agreements to hire students following successful program completion. A recent report showed significant employment and earnings gains in a randomized evaluation of three sector-based training programs that included strong relationships with employers (Maguire 2010).

Developing entrepreneurship training, including mentoring and peer-to-peer training, which may be appropriate and effective in serving the needs of the targeted population. This training should include, at a minimum, programs that focus on developing a business plan, and may also include content focused on market research, marketing, pricing, financing, cash flow, accounting, hiring, permits and licenses, and legal issues. A recent ETA random-assignment demonstration project looked at an entrepreneurship program with classroom training and business counseling and found that program group members started their first business sooner and their businesses had greater longevity than control group businesses (Benus 2009).

4. Strengthen Online and Technology-Enabled Learning: Both individual eligible institutions and consortia of eligible institutions may apply to develop and implement fully-accessible online and technology-enabled learning courses and projects within the funding ranges described in Section II.A of this SGA. DOL is particularly interested in applications from consortia of eligible institutions, as described in Section III.B of this SGA, to develop and implement online and technology-enabled courses and learning projects. A consortium project will leverage expertise and resources from its members, in both the development and implementation of online learning materials, to ensure widespread use and encourage continuous improvement of the courses and learning materials created by these projects. DOL expects that online and technology-enabled learning courses and projects will prepare workers for job opportunities in the consortium members’ community. DOL also encourages applicants to focus on education and training that can be taken to scale beyond a community level to reach significant numbers of diverse students over a larger geographic area.

Online and technology-enabled learning projects will support accelerated learning in a flexible manner that allows students to master concepts or course content more successfully and/or in a shorter period of time than possible with existing methods or the time previously required in cases where similar courses have been offered. The online learning projects developed under this program must contribute to the attainment of degrees, certificates, and other industry-recognized credentials that will better prepare the targeted population for high-wage, high-skill employment. The project proposals must provide evidence to support the design of the online learning projects and procedures for comparing the outcomes of the online project with comparable classroom instruction.

Applicants under this priority should propose projects that include technology-based solutions to effectively teach content to students, enable students to teach themselves, learn from other students, or to engage in hands-on learning, through methods such as interactive simulations, personalized instruction, and elements of game design, including strategies for asynchronous and real-time collaboration among learners as well as between learners and instructors. Online learning materials developed for these projects may include a mix of courses, including remedial or basic courses, developmental courses, foundational courses, gateway courses for career areas (from basic to advanced), and courses that lead to portable and/or stackable degrees, certificates, and other industry-recognized credentials.

All online and technology-enabled courses developed under this SGA must be compliant with the latest version of SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model), as of this writing, version 2004 (3.0). All online and technology-enabled courses must permit free public use and distribution, including the ability to re-use course modules, via an online repository for learning materials to be established by the Federal Government. All grant products will be provided to the Department with meta-data as described in Section III.G.4 of this SGA. To learn about SCORM, download the standard, and test completed training products, please visit http://www.adlnet.gov/Technologies/scorm/default.aspx.

All online and technology-enabled courses developed under this SGA must incorporate the principles of universal design in order to ensure that they are readily accessible to qualified individuals with disabilities in full compliance with the Americans with Disability Act and Sections 504 and 508 of the Federal Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as amended.

In addition, technology-based consortium projects are strongly encouraged to leverage expertise from content experts in the development of online learning materials. In the implementation and adoption of these materials, technology-based consortium projects may also leverage broad networks of education and training institutions to ensure widespread use and encourage continuous improvement of the courses and learning materials created by these projects. Applicants should refer to Section III.D for more information on Leveraged Expertise.

Strategies for Priority 4 include, but are not limited to:

Incorporating competency-based assessments, as appropriate, to allow students to demonstrate mastery of content and skills, as well as contribute to attainment of certificates or degrees, based on performance on such assessments rather than on course credits or hours.

Offering academic credit to students on the same basis as other equivalent onsite courses offered by the grant recipients (in the case of full courses).

Providing continuous feedback to the learner and instructor in order to automatically identify and remediate individual student learning deficits, whenever feasible, to help the student master course content and enable an instructor to determine whether a student needs additional assistance or instruction.

Incorporating mechanisms to provide feedback to course designers and instructors so that courses may be improved as students attend them.

Offering multiple delivery points to educational programs so participants are able to learn from a worksite, a Web site, or a classroom.

Making improvements to the infrastructure necessary for hosting online programs that enable public use.

C. Allowable Activities Applicants may only propose activities that directly impact the provision of education and training. Within the framework of priorities and strategies in this SGA, a broad range of activities are allowable and applicants must propose budgets commensurate with their proposed project design.

The Department anticipates that the majority of applicants will include two specific types of allowable activities to support their work: a) hiring and/or training additional instructors or staff (including the costs of salaries and benefits)to assist in the development and/or delivery of new curricula, and establishing internship, Registered Apprenticeship, or clinical/cooperative education programs at employer sites; and b) purchasing or upgrading classroom supplies and equipment that will serve an integral instructional purpose in education and training courses supported by the grant or cover costs associated with implementing changes in the time or scheduling of courses.

Other allowable activities may include, but are not limited to, leasing space that is used for education and training and related activities, altering facilities that are used for education and training and related activities (which could include ensuring that the facilities comply with federal architectural accessibility obligations that require facilities to be readily accessible to and usable by qualified individuals with disabilities), implementing and/or enhancing the information technology infrastructure used to provide education and training and related activities, organizing and/or analyzing program data for program evaluation, and other costs of program development such as using subject matter experts from industry, education, state workforce agency labor market and economic research entities, and other areas to inform and assist in curriculum design. Applicants should note that specific Grant Officer approval will be required for the alteration of facilities after grant awards are made. Applicants should refer to Section VI of the SGA for a list of relevant Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Circulars related to cost principles, administrative and other requirements that apply to this Solicitation.

Unallowable activities include the use of grant funds to pay the costs of tuition, wages of participants (including the wages of students participating in co-operative education programs, Registered Apprenticeship, or internships), stipends for wage replacement of participants, the purchase of real property, and construction. Applicants should ensure they do not propose these activities, as they may duplicate services, benefits, or stipends provided to workers eligible for assistance under the TAA, Unemployment Insurance, or Workforce Investment Act programs.

Applicants may not use grant funds to supplant other funding sources they are currently using to fund existing activities. As with all costs charged to the grant, the costs of equipment must meet the standards in the applicable Federal cost principles found in Part VI of this SGA, including that the costs are reasonable and necessary to achieve grant outcomes and have prior approval from the Grant Officer after a grant is received.

D. Sustainability Congress has provided the TAACCCT with four years of funding. Because permanent funding is not anticipated, applicants are strongly encouraged to ensure that effective innovations developed under this program are sustained after the grant period ends. As indicated in Section V.A.3.i, applicants must describe how they will use data to determine which strategies and activities were effective and explain how they would integrate effective practices into core programs to enact broader institutional improvements. This sustainability planning may require securing funding or future funding commitments from non-Federal sources. Given limited availability of funding, applicants may look to develop low-cost strategies for integrating effective practices funded under the grant into their general operations. For example, an institution could propose that instructors funded to form a discrete learning community in a part of that institution during the three year period of performance would, if the proposal was achieving results, work with other instructors once the grant has ended to integrate learning community practices more widely across the institution. Where possible, applicants should encourage other institutions to adopt successful strategies developed with these funds.

E. Targeted Population

The intent of this SGA is to fund projects that expand and improve the ability of eligible institutions to provide education and training programs that are suitable for the diverse population of workers eligible for training under the TAA for Workers program. Workers certified as eligible for trade adjustment assistance are eligible to apply for income support payments, the health coverage tax credit, and training and other services provided by the States with Federal TAA funds. While the Solicitation supports education and training programs suited to this targeted population, the s.

Department expects that once the programs are implemented, they would also benefit a wide range of individuals.

F. Required Community Outreach for Needs Assessment and Project Planning

The proposed project must meet the education and training needs of the targeted population and effectively prepare them for job opportunities in the “community” or “communities” identified by the applicant. For purposes of the TAACCCT, a “community” is a “city, county, or other political subdivision of a State or a consortium of political subdivisions of a State,” as defined under Section 271(2) of the Trade Act (19 USC 2371(2)). The applicant must demonstrate that it performed outreach to, and gathered information on, relevant entities in the communities to be served by the project, including the characteristics and skill needs of workers receiving TAA assistance in the community. In addition, the outreach will help ensure that the project complements and does not duplicate existing programs in the community. As evidence of this outreach process, the applicant must include the documentation listed in Section IV.B Part III, which describes the required data on the need for education and training within its community. The needs-assessment information gathered through the community outreach will factor heavily into the applicant’s Statement of Need (see Section V.A.1), and will form the basis for developing the project work plan.

In collecting the information described above, applicants must reach out to and use data from the following organizations, to the extent appropriate to the program being proposed:

Employers and industry associations, including small- and medium-sized firms, and if applicable, representing emerging industries;

Local, county, and/or State government agencies, including the State workforce agency that administers the TAA for Workers program;

Local Workforce Investment Boards (WIBs) established under Section 117 of the Workforce Investment Act of 1998 (29 U.S.C. 2832);

Labor organizations, including State and local labor federations and labor-management initiatives, representing workers in the community;

Local educational agencies, and other relevant educational entities, such as career and technical education and adult education programs serving the community;

In addition to the required organizations listed above, applicants are strongly encouraged to reach out to and use data from the following organizations:

Community-based organizations that may provide supportive services and play a role in outreach to ensure the diversity of the targeted population;

Sponsors of Registered Apprenticeship programs;

State workforce agency labor market information and/or economic research entities;

Economic development agencies;

Small business development organizations; and, Existing federally- or state-funded consortia, such as regional cluster2 consortia, that are organized by related sector or regional focus and that may inform the applicant’s activitie

2 Regional clusters are geographic concentrations of firms and industries that do business with each other and have common needs for talent, technology, and infrastructure. The strengths and relationships within these interconnected firms – as well as with supporting organizations in the region – create a multiplier effect that increases efficiency and innovation, and ultimately enhances conditions for businesses to prosper. A cluster will encompass local universities, government research centers, and other research and development resources, which serve as catalysts of innovation and drivers of regional economic growth. A successful cluster will leverage the region's unique competitive strengths and find ways to nurture networks for entrepreneurship, business financing, business-to-business sales, education, and workforce development. Clusters include an array of strategic partners, such as (but not limited to) state and local government, labor organizations, venture capitalists, private banks, workforce investment boards, community organizations, and community colleges and other institutions of higher education.

Applicants must involve at least one employer in the implementation of the project, as described in Section III.E of this SGA. DOL also strongly encourages applicants to involve other stakeholder organizations listed above in the implementation of the project.

II. Award Information A. Award Amount

Under this SGA, DOL intends to award up to $500 million in grant funds to eligible institutions as described in Section III. These awards will fund the development of innovative programs or replication of evidence-based strategies, and will support eligible institutions that are committed to using data to continuously evaluate the effectiveness of their strategies in order to improve their programming. DOL intends to make awards to eligible institutions ranging from $2.5 million to $5 million for individual applicants, and awards of $2.5 million to $20 million for a consortium of eligible institutions as described in Section III.B. DOL does not expect to fund any project for less than $2.5 million but will consider applications below that amount with proper justification. In the event additional funds become available, ETA reserves the right to use such funds to select additional grantees from applications submitted in response to this solicitation.

Grants may exceed the award amount ceiling on two conditions only:

Individual or consortium applicants propose to replicate, at multiple sites and/or with the targeted and other populations, strategies that have been shown by prior research to have strong or moderate evidence of positive impacts on education and/or employment outcomes. See Attachment F for more information on the Evidence-Based Conceptual Framework; or

Individual or consortium applicants propose to develop and implement online and technology-enabled courses and learning projects that will be taken to scale beyond the community level to reach significant numbers of diverse students over a large geographic area.

See Section V.B of this SGA for more information on the additional requirements for applicants who wish to exceed the funding caps. All applicants wishing to exceed the funding caps must have a well-justified budget. Under these two conditions, individual applicants may request an additional $2 million, while consortium applicants may request an additional level of funding that is commensurate with the project’s scope, specific activity costs, and the likely importance and magnitude of its impact on student outcomes.

Section 279(b) of the Trade Act of 1974 (19 USC 2372a(b)), specifies that not less than 0.5 percent of the amount appropriated for these grant awards, or $2.5 million, will support eligible institutions in each State. In the case of an award to a consortium, the proportion of funding allocated to each member in the Budget Narrative (as described in Section III.B and IV.B. Part I of this SGA) will be used to attribute the funding amount to the state in which the consortium member institution resides.

In order to ensure that at least one eligible institution from each of the 50 States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico (see Section 247(8) of the Trade Act of 1974, 19 USC 2319(8)) receives an award, the Grant Officer will first select fundable applications that represent as many States as possible. If the Grant Officer finds that a State is not represented by a fundable application, a determination will be made whether any non-fundable applications can be made fundable by placing conditions on the grant. If the Grant Officer determines that no applications can be made fundable by placing conditions on the grant, or if there are no applications received from eligible institutions within a given State, DOL will make contact with the State agency responsible for the State college system to identify, and work with, an eligible institution to submit a proposal.

B. Period of Performance

The period of performance for these grant awards will be 36 months from the effective date of the grant. However, applicants may propose a period of grant performance that is less than 36 months if it is reasonable and appropriate to the project timeline, deliverables, and proposed award amount. This performance period includes all necessary implementation and start-up activities, program development and enhancement, pre- and post-program services, and grant close-out activities. A timeline clearly detailing the required grant activities, progress measures, outcomes, and their expected completion dates must be included in the grant application. Applicants should note that DOL may elect to exercise its option to award no-cost extensions to grants for an additional period, based on the success of the program and other relevant factors, if the grantee applies and provides a significant justification for an extension.

III. Eligibility Information A. Eligible Institutions

Eligible institutions are institutions of higher education as defined in Section 102 of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1002) which offer programs that can be completed in not more than 2 years. These "institutions of higher education" include public, proprietary, or other nonprofit educational institutions. Applicants must identify their institution type in Section 9 of the SF-424 Application for Federal Assistance. Eligible institutions must be accredited by a nationally recognized accrediting agency or association that has been recognized by the U.S. Department of Education. A database of institutions that are accredited by bodies recognized by the U.S.

Department of Education can be found at http://ope.ed.gov/accreditation/. Applicants are strongly encouraged to check this Web site, as the Department will reference this database in determining an applicant’s accreditation to ensure eligibility. Generally, institutions of higher education include 2-year and 4-year colleges and universities, Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Tribal Colleges and Universities, and Hispanic Serving Institutions, among others.

B. Consortium Applicants

Institutions of higher education may submit a proposal on behalf of a consortium of eligible institutions. For the purpose of this solicitation, a consortium is comprised of two or more individual eligible institutions, as defined in Section III.A of this SGA, that do not constitute a single legal entity, but who join together to apply for an award under this solicitation. While consortium applicants must meet the education and training needs of workers impacted by foreign trade in at least one community served by the consortium, consortium applicants must report education and training outcomes as described in Section V.A.3 for all program participants. In addition, the Department strongly encourages consortium applicants to propose projects that focus on regional, national, or industry-wide education and training needs, and membership may cross geographic boundaries as necessary to the project design. Consortium applicants are also encouraged to leverage expertise from content experts, as well as broad networks of education and training institutions, as described in Section III.D of this SGA. Consortium applicants may submit proposals for quality projects at any funding level that is demonstrated to be reasonable and appropriate to the scope and complexity of the proposed project.

A consortium applicant must clearly indicate in the required abstract that the application is a consortium proposal and identify each consortium member. Consortium applicants must also provide in their Technical Proposal a complete description of each consortium member’s role in the design, development, and implementation of the project in each community. Consortium applicants must also identify in the application a lead institution in the consortium that will serve as the grantee and have overall fiscal and administrative responsibility for the grant. This grantee institution must be the organization specified in Section 8 of the SF-424 Application Form.

For the purposes of this Solicitation, the grantee institution specified on the SF-424 Application Form will be: 1) the point of contact with DOL to receive and respond to all inquiries or communications under this SGA and any subsequent grant award; 2) the entity with authority to withdraw or draw down funds through the Department of Health and Human Services - Payment Management System (HHS-PMS); 3) responsible for submitting to DOL all deliverables under the grant, including all technical and financial reports related to the project, regardless of which consortium member performed the work; 4) the entity that may request or agree to a revision or amendment of the grant agreement or statement of work; 5) the entity with overall responsibility for carrying out the programmatic functions of the grant, as well as for the stewardship of all expenditures under the grant; and 6) the entity responsible for working with DOL to close out the grant.

An applicant applying as a consortium must provide as an attachment to its technical proposal a consortium agreement, which could take many forms including but not limited to a letter, agreement, or Memorandum of Understanding, but which must be signed by each consortium member and: 1) reflect an appropriate agreement among…