How Priorities Work in U.S. K-12 School Safety Grants

The U.S. Department of Education awarded about $6 billion in discretionary grants during the 2023 fiscal year, distributing funding to states and school districts through a competitive process.

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently reviewed the department’s priorities for grants over time, categorizing which themes were the most compelling or the highest priority between 2001 and 2024.

The Education Department announced 78 departmentwide priorities between 2001 and 2021, and while some priorities replaced previous ones, others are still in place.

The priorities help the department structure and guide grant programs. They range from professional development opportunities for teachers to improving high school graduation rates to boosting education in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, or computer science, as well as COVID-19 pandemic recovery. Grant announcements contained up to 10 priorities during that 20-year period.

Grant priorities can fall under three conditions:

• Absolute: Applicants must meet one or more of these conditions to be considered for a grant.
  
  
• Competitive preference: Applications that address these conditions can potentially receive more points.
  
  
• Invitational: Applicants are encouraged—but not required—to address these conditions, and no additional points or preference will be awarded.
  
  

Educational officials told GAO researchers that priorities can be helpful in programs with broad authorizing statutes, such as the School Safety National Activities program. Each grant announcement between 2001 and 2024 for this program included at least one priority and at most seven. Of that program's grant priorities, 54 percent were absolute, 45 percent competitive, and only 1 percent invitational.

When it comes to grants related to student safety and wellbeing, the GAO mapped out some key themes that the School Safety National Activities program (and its predecessor, the Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities National Activities program) used to guide K-12 education grantmaking.

The most common school safety themes between 2001 and 2016 were preventing drug abuse and violence, applying as a new potential grantee, and emergency response and crisis management planning.

More recently, grant themes between 2017 and 2024 prioritized serving specific populations or geographic areas; collaboration, coordination, or partnerships with other organizations; and building capacity for school infrastructure, the GAO reported in K-12 Education: Education’s Priorities in Discretionary Grantmaking.

In 2024, multiple grant programs also prioritized applicants seeking to increase the number of school-based mental health services providers. In 2023, the program appropriated $216,000,000 in grants.

For more about how to successfully apply for school security grants, check out this Security Management article from 2023: "Top 10 Best Practices for Security Grant Writing"