Today, the U.S. Department of Education (Department) released the FY 2022 notice inviting applications (NIA) for the Jacob K. Javits Gifted and Talented Students Education Program (Javits). The program will award up to $6.6 million in new grants for five-year projects that support evidence-based research, demonstration projects, innovative strategies, and similar activities that enhance elementary and secondary schools’ capacity to identify gifted and talented students and meet their unique educational needs.
Supporting all students, including gifted and talented students, with accelerated learning opportunities is critical to addressing the impacts of lost instructional time and supporting positive academic outcomes for all children. Accelerated learning opportunities can help to ensure students excel and thrive.
“Expanding access to gifted and talented programs is one important way that we can ensure all students—particularly those who are underserved—have the opportunity to engage in rich, rigorous learning experiences that open doors for them to discover new passions and reach their potential,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona. “This work is perhaps more important now than ever before, when we must support students through our nation’s continued recovery from the pandemic and boldly address opportunity gaps in our education system.”
The Department strives to ensure that the educational needs of underserved children and youth, including those with disabilities who are gifted and talented, are met. Addressing and closing educational opportunity gaps in underserved communities—before and after the pandemic—are one of the top priorities of the Biden-Harris Administration. A major emphasis of the Javits program is to identify and serve students underrepresented in gifted and talented programs, to include the training of personnel in the identification and education of gifted and talented students and in the use, where appropriate, of gifted and talented services, materials, and methods, for all students.
The FY 2022 Javits program competition focuses on students who are underserved and underrepresented in gifted and talented programs by including an absolute priority that applicants must address to be eligible for review. This year’s application requires applicants to develop “new information that assists schools in the identification of, and provision of services to, gifted and talented students (including economically disadvantaged individuals, individuals who are multilingual learners, and children with disabilities) who may not be identified and served through traditional assessment methods.”
Eligible applicants include state educational agencies; local educational agencies, the Bureau of Indian Education; institutions of higher education; other public agencies; or other private agencies or organizations.
Applications are due on April 4, 2022. Successful applicants will be selected through a competitive peer review process, and awards will be made by August 2022. A pre-application webinar will be held for potential applicants on Feb. 24, 2022, from 1 – 4 p.m. ET, via MS Teams. Information about the pre-application meeting will be posted here.
