Technical Support for Career and Technical Education Innovation Challenges

Added: Aug 14, 2014 3:52 pm The purpose of this Amendment to the Notice is to formally issue Amendment 0001 to Solicitation ED-VAE-14-R-0058.  Amendment 0001 provides the Department of Education's responses to questions received from interested parties regarding the Solicitation.  It also includes a revised Instructions to Offerors based on the questions received along with revised Performance Work Statements for the IDIQ contract, Task Order 0001 and Task Order 0002.

The time and date for submission of responses by interested parties to the Solicitation remains unchanged.  Written responses to Solicitation ED-VAE-14-R-0058 are due no later than 10:30 a.m. Eastern Time on August 22, 2014. 

Added: Aug 08, 2014 8:50 pm The purpose of this modification to the Notice for Solicitation ED-VAE-14-R-0058 is to formally issue the Solicitation.  Please note that this procurement has an accelerated processing time in order for the Department of Education to meet its operational requirements.

Responses to the Solicitation must be submitted electronically in accordance with the guidance and direction contained in the Instructions to Offerors in sufficient time to be fully received by Stephen Madsen, the Contract Specialist, no later than 10:30 AM Eastern Time on August 22, 2014. Offerors shall also cc Stephen Scheffer, the Contracting Officer.

Questions regarding the Solicitation shall be submitted to Stephen Madsen, the Contract Specialist, with cc to Stephen Scheffer, the Contracting Officer, by 11:00 AM Eastern Time, August 13, 2014.

Added: Aug 01, 2014 6:12 pm This Modification to the Pre-Solicitation Notice for ED-VAE-14-R-0058 includes updated DRAFT documents for the DRAFT Solicitation in order to provide interested parties with the most current information to enable them to begin preparing their proposal submissions.

The Department's operational requirements have resulted in a revised procurement schedule that will include issuance of Solicitation ED-VAE-14-R-0058 on or about August 8, 2014 with a request for proposal responses to be submitted in sufficient time to arrive at the Department on August 22, 2014.

At this time, the Department is issuing updated DRAFT documents for the following:

Performance Work Statement for the IDIQ Contract
Performance Work Statement for Task Order 0001
Performance Work Statement for Task Order 0002
DRAFT Instructions to Offerors
DRAFT Evaluation Criteria 

These documents are subject to change up to the time the Solicitation if formally issued; however, they do represent the Department's most current direction. 

Added: Jul 29, 2014 10:26 am The U.S. Department of Education, Office of Career, Technical and Adult Education (OCTAE) anticipates issuing a formal solicitation on a small business set-aside basis for a single-award Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (ID/IQ) contract for technical support for career and technical education innovation challenges. The IDIQ contract is expected to have a continuous period of performance of 60 months during which discreet task orders may be issued.

The purpose of this procurement is to obtain technical support for the Department's OCTAE Program Office for the administration and management of public competitions, challenges, and exploration of emerging technology to support career and technical education programs. The technical support activities are intended to provide OCTAE with subject matter expertise and thought partnership in advancing the use of emerging technologies to expand the capacity of career and technical education.

Tasks may range from short duration, urgent requests to longer term (i.e., longer than 12 months) strategic technology development projects. The tasks issued under the contract will involve logistical and administrative support for competitions involving software development; exploration of education technology; development and implementation of national communication strategies; scans of industries and labor markets; collection and analysis of data; and policy analysis.  In addition, the contract may involve logistical support and related support for conferences and meetings.

The contract is intended to provide technical support to the Department across a wide range of subject areas related to key issues in:

- Challenges, competitions and disbursement of cash prizes to support development initiatives

- Mobile software application development

- Two and three dimensional simulations

- Development and deployment of websites and web-based applications

- Software programming and interoperability standards

- Communication and outreach.

Specific and immediate areas of interest to the Department include:

- Analysis of the eduction simulation, gaming, software and hardware markets

- Management of challenges to identify innovative simulations and mobile applications to assist with career exploration

- Exploration and analysis of interoperability standards for educational simulations

Given the broad and diverse nature of this procurement requirement, the Department anticipates that interested parties should be experienced with team approaches consisting of specialized team members to complement one another in succesfully performing the range of functional requirements described in the attached Performance Work Statements (PWSs) for the IDIQ contract and the two initial task orders.

The Department is seeking a contractor skilled in conducting and managing national competitions, conducting outreach, evaluating submissions, and awarding cash prizes and also has a thorough understanding of information technology, online communications, social media, using crowd sourcing as a means to solve complex problems, and Federal data collection and competion policies.

The Department plans to issue the formal solicitation within the next two weeks and expects to make award of a single-award IDIQ contract and two task orders prior to the end of September 2014.  The acquisition will be a small business set-aside.  Participation by Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Businesses and HUBZone Small Businesses is strongly encouraged.

Attached to this Notice are the following documents:

1.  Transcript from June 11, 2014 Webinar
2.  PowerPoint presentation from June 11, 2014 Webinar
3.  List of companies and individuals who registered for the June 11, 2014 Webinar
4.  DRAFT Performance Work Statement for CTE Innovation Challenges IDIQ Contract
5.  DRAFT Performance Work Statement for CTE Innovation Challenge IDIQ Task Order 0001
6.  DRAFT Performance Work Statement for CTE Innovation Challenge IDIQ Task Order 0002