The upcoming round of DRS was scheduled to open for competition on Tuesday, January 28, 2025. Notice of Funding Opportunities (NOFOs) were not released as scheduled. The forecast for these grants has not been updated with a new timeline.
Last week, federal grant recipients, including Head Start grantees, experienced uncertainty about their immediate funding and future of their grants. While it’s unclear when currently forecasted grant opportunities will move forward, we encourage programs awaiting a DRS competition to use this time to prepare.
Some of the most foundational ways you can use this time is to focus on the big pieces of your grant application. The first is data readiness – making sure you have current data about the areas that will be required in the grant application. Assuming the upcoming DRS competitions mirror previous rounds, this will include data on community needs, eligible children, and the availability of and access to other early learning programs, in addition to wage data. High quality data collection and analysis will support your program’s ability to respond to the criteria in the NOFO.
Second, we recommend getting started on program design and budget planning. This will include thinking through your program’s start up needs. If your program has a program design and budget plan, the grant application will likely move ahead more easily and smoothly than starting from scratch when the NOFO is released.
Third, it’s not too soon to log in to Grants.gov. You won’t be able to set up your application yet (because the NOFO hasn’t been released). But, you can log into Grants.gov to ensure that your credentials are up to date. If applying for the first time, you will also need to Register. If you run into any issues logging into Grants.gov or registering, you should contact the Grants.gov Support Center.
Foundations for Families offers a variety of Consulting Services to support programs in DRS. If your program has the capacity to write its own grant application but needs help with the timeline, template, and process, consider Foundations for Families’ DRS Toolkit. Explore a Quality Assurance Review to help ensure your program is submitting the most competitive application. Please be in touch to learn more. We would be glad to talk with you about your program’s needs.
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