MacArthur Foundation’s 2012 Call for Proposals: Strengthening Innovation and Practice in Secondary Education

The MacArthur Foundation in collaboration with The MasterCard Foundation, Wellspring Advisors and Douglas B. Marshall, Jr. Family Foundation has announced the 2012 Call for Proposals: Strengthening Innovation and Practice in Secondary Education. These funders have allocated up to $5 million for the Call for Proposals subject to the quality of proposals received, and will consider funding levels between $50,000 and $500,000 over a period of one to three years for projects.

Types of Projects

Applications are invited for the following types of projects.

Research – including descriptive studies of the nature of problems and rigorous evaluations of promising programs that help build an evidence base that informs programming, experimentation and policy planning, as well as building research capacity.

Pilot projects testing innovations – testing approaches to particular problems such as tailoring courses of study/curriculum to varied and changing labor market needs for “21st Century skills”, exploring the use of technology to deliver and to enrich instruction and learning, reducing barriers and facilitating transition and completion of secondary education for vulnerable groups, achieving and sustaining gender equity, and ensuring improved and relevant learning outcomes.

Scale-up of successful models – scoping activities to examine models of public-private partnership; explore the cost-effectiveness, relevance, strategic fit and scalability of different service delivery models; and build relationships among government, industry and private actors to develop collaborative strategies to implement first phase efforts to expand proven interventions.

Applicants may propose work in the following geographic areas.

•     East Africa (Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Rwanda)
•     Nigeria (particularly the states of Kano, Sokoto, Jigawa, Lagos and Rivers)
•     India (particularly the states of Rajasthan, Gujarat and Maharashtra)

The application process will involve two successive review stages: Letters of Inquiry (LOI) and Proposals. Successful applications will be invited to advance to the second, Proposal, phase of the review process.

Deadline for all Letters of Inquiry submissions is July 5, 2012 at 12:00pm CDT. For more information, visit this link.