NoVo Foundation: Regional Social and Emotional Learning Convenings Grants

NoVo Foundation, in partnership with Education First and Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, aims to support regional collaborative learning opportunities. A new grant program, the Regional Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) Convenings grants (RSC grants), will provide funding and technical assistance to districts, charter networks, and/or other organizational partners to design and host a convening that brings together educators, other SEL experts, and other stakeholders to build capacity to equitably meet students’ social, emotional, and academic needs.

The goal of the Regional SEL Convenings grants—an outgrowth of the SEL Innovation Awards (http://selforteachers.org/2018-innovation-awards/) and national SEL in Action Convenings hosted by the NoVo Foundation—is to help district and school communities create a convening that builds educators’ and other adults’ capacity to meet students’ social, emotional, and academic needs with an equity lens. Applicants should also set individual goals and objectives aligned to their local context and needs. Selected proposals should include grant activities that will occur during the 2020 calendar year. Selected applicants will also receive technical assistance from Education First during the design phase of their grant. This assistance will leverage Education First’s experience and resources designing and executing convenings for educators and other audiences—although the convening priorities and decision-making will at all times remain the grantees’.

Priority will be given to applicants that:

• Enroll 25,000 students or more (collectively)
• Serve a critical mass of students farthest from opportunity—for example, at least 60 percent of students served by the lead partner organization support one or more of these student populations: students from low-income families, students of color, students from indigenous communities, new arrivals (such as refugees or immigrants), English learners, LGBTQIA+ students, students disproportionately affected by suspensions or the juvenile justice system, students with learning disabilities
• Propose to design and host a regional SEL convening that focuses on building capacity for educators and other adults to meet students’ social, emotional, and academic needs through equitable, inclusive, and culturally affirming practices and environments
• Articulate a vision of how this regional SEL convening is part of the partners’ larger, ongoing SEL and equity strategy
• Demonstrate capacity to design and implement the convening during the 2020 calendar year
• Are seeking to catalyze teacher-to-teacher relationships and build local capacity for equitable SEL implementation
• Demonstrate district and/or charter leader support for the effort

Amount: Two to four grants of $50,000 to $100,000 each will be awarded during this initial cycle.

Eligibility: The grant will require a single budget managed by a single lead organization, such as a school district, charter network, or nonprofit organization. The lead organization will be allowed to make sub-grants to and enter into contracts with other organizations to help successfully design and host the convening.

To be eligible to apply for a maximum $100,000 Regional SEL Convening grant, applicants must:

• Be a partnership between two or more organizations, where one organization is a school district/local education agency (LEA) or charter network/charter management organization (CMO). Examples of possible non-LEA partners could be a public education fund, a local community-based organization such as a community foundation, a higher education partner, or another youth-serving nonprofit with experience supporting students’ and adults’ social and emotional learning.
• Be planning a convening that is “regional” and not confined to participants in a single school district or charter network.
• Consider SEL implementation and equitable and culturally affirming environments significant strategies for improving student outcomes.

Notes:

• Current NoVo Educator Practice Community (EPC) grantees are not eligible to apply for the RSC grants
• RSC grants are not intended to be used exclusively or primarily to purchase professional development, trainings, or materials from a single provider or vendor

Link: https://novofoundation.org/updatesfromnovo/grant-opportunity-to-support-sel-and-equity-in-your-community/

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