A Pennsylvania grant program will award up to $350,000 for municipalities, community organizations, and select others willing to partner with a school to address community violence.
The deadline to apply for the grant is February 7.
Here are some of the details of the program:
What?
The Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency (PCCD) will award the grant for programs designed to reduce community violence. Programs are anticipated to make schools safer by:
- Increasing access to quality trauma-informed support services and behavioral health care
- Providing health services and intervention strategies
- Creating mentorship and other intervention opportunities to children who have experienced trauma, including students who are homeless, low-income, in foster care, involved in the criminal justice system, or otherwise are at risk of experiencing trauma
- Fostering communication between schools, the community, and law enforcement
Who may apply?
Eligible applicants include municipalities, counties, institutions of higher education and community-based organizations working in conjunction with school districts or school entities to propose programming to reduce community violence.
These grants require K-12 schools to partner with eligible organizations in order to access funding. The partnership requirement facilitates relationships that are necessary to create strong programming.
Why?
The community violence program grants differ from the earlier School Safety and Security grants. One of the weaknesses described in the Governor’s School Safety Task Force Report was a lack of partnerships between schools and community organizations. These new grants require that partnership.
Can the school district compose and submit the application after partnering with an eligible applicant?
The eligible applicant, and not the school, should submit grant applications to the School Safety and Security Committee using the commission’s eGrant system. Eligible applicants are encouraged to collaborate with local school entities to create effective proposals.
When?
The deadline to submit applications is February 7. The commission will field questions until the close of business on February 4. The PCCD publishes a Q&A page of questions as they are answered.
Do not wait until February 7 to register on eGrants. Eligible applicants – the non-K-12 school groups – should register with PCCD’s eGrants system as soon as possible. Registration my take a few days and the application is not accessible unless the eligible applicant is registered.
What else do I need to know?
The committee published a funding announcement providing guidance on the application process. Some key points to consider as you work with an eligible applicant to create a proposal are:
- Do not exceed $350,000 in your proposal.
- Project durations should be two years or less. If the project needs to be extended, eligible applicants will be permitted to submit a modification request but will not receive additional funding.
- The keyword in the eGrants drop down menu is “Violence Prevention.”
- The application process is competitive, which means proposals will be scored and applications should be tailored to the requirements in the funding announcement. PCCD will administratively reject applications that do not follow directions. A complete application must include a signature page.
- Pay special attention to the program goals and types of activities the grant intends to support. Descriptions of the statement of the problem, problem design and implementation, and impact and outcomes are worth the most points. These sections of the application should have a clear relationship to the program goals and types of activities as described in the funding announcement. Support proposals with local data and research to strengthen your application.
- Use Section 9 of the funding announcement as a checklist to capture maximum points.
- Grant recipients will be required to adopt and report performance measures. Therefore, applications must include performance measures that are specifically related to the activities described in the application.
- Procurement by competitive proposals per the commission’s Applicant Manual are encouraged. Procurement by noncompetitive proposals are strongly discouraged and require additional justification.
