Professional Formation of Engineers | Apply Online

Opportunity Summary:

The National Science Foundation (NSF), through its Engineering (ENG) Directorate, launched the Professional Formation of Engineers (PFE) initiative as a multi-year effort aimed at strengthening and modernizing how engineers are developed for the 21st century. The core idea behind PFE is that becoming an engineer is not only about mastering technical content, but also about the formal and informal experiences, professional norms, identities, and value systems that shape how people enter and grow within the profession. The initiative also emphasizes an ethical duty within engineering to sustain and improve the profession over time. In practical terms, NSF is looking to support work that helps the engineering profession remain responsive to national priorities, major societal and technological challenges, and changing workforce demands, while also becoming more inclusive and accessible to all.

A key component of this initiative is the Professional Formation of Engineers: Research Initiation in Engineering Formation (PFE RIEF) program. This program is designed specifically to help engineering faculty who are known for strong teaching, mentoring, or educational leadership take a first step into doing rigorous research on engineering formation. The main mechanism is collaboration: PFE RIEF encourages engineering faculty to partner with experts in the social sciences and/or learning sciences to tackle complex, boundary-crossing questions about how engineers are formed, how professional identity and ethics develop, how institutional culture shapes pathways into engineering, and what changes in curriculum or learning environments meaningfully improve professional preparation. The intent is to spark new research capacity and new cross-disciplinary teams, not simply to continue the work of established engineering education researchers.

In terms of eligibility, proposals may be submitted by accredited US universities and colleges, including two-year and four-year institutions such as community colleges, as long as they have a campus located in the United States and are applying on behalf of their faculty. The principal investigator or at least one co-principal investigator must be a faculty member in an engineering department, and that person must not have received NSF engineering education or professional formation funding through the Division of Engineering Education and Centers (EEC) within the last three years. NSF explicitly encourages participation from senior faculty as well as recently tenured faculty who may be exploring new directions, signaling that the program welcomes experienced technical scholars who want to pivot toward research on education and professional development. At the same time, NSF makes clear that the program is not meant to serve as an additional funding stream for researchers already well established in engineering education; those investigators are expected to pursue other NSF opportunities such as the Research in Engineering Education program.

This opportunity was offered as a discretionary grant under CFDA 47.041 (Engineering Grants) with no cost-sharing or matching requirement. The estimated total funding amount listed is $150,000, and the award floor is also $150,000, which implies awards were structured around that level. The opportunity was originally posted on February 2, 2015, with an original closing date of April 30, 2015, later reflecting a current closing date of March 31, 2016, and it was ultimately archived on April 25, 2020. Applicants looking for the full details were directed to NSF Publication 15-539, and technical access issues were routed through grants.gov support.

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Previous opportunity: 2015 Broad Agency Announcement

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