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The NOAA Office of Education is pleased to announce the Environmental Literacy Program (ELP) fiscal year 2020 funding opportunity. This grant competition is designed to fund projects that build environmental literacy to enhance community resilience.
Guests at PrepareAThon measure temperatures and relate them to the drivers of Richmond's urban heat islands using infrared thermometers, exhibits designed by the Franklin Institute, and Science Museum of Virginia community science data. (Image credit: Jeremy Hoffman/Science Museum of Virginia)
Facing threats ranging from severe storms to persistent drought or sea level rise, communities across the country need to be ready, responsive, and resilient to extreme weather and other environmental hazards. Education plays an important role in helping communities become less vulnerable to environmental hazards and more prepared to recover from disasters.
Since the program’s inception in 2005, ELP’s grants have supported projects that educate and inspire people to use Earth system science toward improving ecosystem stewardship and increasing resilience to environmental hazards. The 2020 opportunity will fund projects that empower communities to develop and apply environmental literacy in order to accomplish their resilience goals.
This funding opportunity is soliciting two types of projects through separate competitive priorities. Priority 1 will support new projects located in the Southern and Western Regions of the United States. See the apply page for eligible states. Priority 2 will support the continued evolution of Environmental Literacy Program grant projects funded in 2015-2016. View the list of eligible awards. The Environmental Literacy Program plans to issue a funding opportunity, including a priority to support new projects from the Eastern and Central regions, which comprise the remainder of the country, in fall 2021.
For both priorities, eligible applicants are institutions of higher education; K-12 public and independent schools and school systems, other nonprofits, including community-based organizations and informal education institutions, such as museums, zoos, and aquariums; state and local government agencies; and Indian tribal governments in the United States.
For Priority 1, the deadline for pre-applications (required) is 11:59 pm EST on November 25, 2019 and the deadline for full applications is 11:59 pm EDT on March 26, 2020. For Priority 2, pre-applications are not required and the deadline for full applications is 11:59 pm EST on February 11, 2020.
To learn more about the competition and past projects, visit the Environmental Literacy Grants web page. To read the full funding announcement (NOAA-SEC-OED-2020-2006190), please visit Grants.gov. Applicants are strongly encouraged to review resilience education projects funded by this program since 2015 and proposed projects should be informed by the lessons learned by these grantees.
