STEM C Partnerships Computing Education for the 21st Century | Apply Online

Opportunity Summary:

The National Science Foundation (NSF) grant opportunity titled "STEM C Partnerships: Computing Education for the 21st Century" (NSF 14-523) is a research and development program designed to improve K-12 STEM teaching and learning, with computing treated as a central and increasingly necessary part of modern STEM preparation. The program is jointly led by two NSF directorates, Education and Human Resources (EHR) and Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE), and it merges and extends two earlier NSF efforts: the Math and Science Partnership (MSP) program and the Computing Education for the 21st Century (CE21) program. The basic idea is to fund strong, institutional partnerships that can both produce measurable improvements in student outcomes and generate usable evidence about what works, especially as schools and communities adapt to a knowledge-based economy where computing and information technology shape many careers and fields.

A core theme of the solicitation is partnership-driven change. Funded projects are expected to bring together cross-disciplinary teams that can address STEM learning from multiple angles, including expertise from STEM faculty and researchers, K-12 teachers and administrators, and learning science and education research communities (for example, cognitive science, developmental and social psychology, and broader social science perspectives). The program frames this work as "K-16" in practice, meaning it is not only about what happens in elementary and secondary classrooms, but also about the pipeline that prepares and supports teachers, including the undergraduate-level structures and experiences that influence future K-12 STEM educators. Within these partnerships, the program emphasizes teacher preparation, ongoing professional development for in-service teachers, and sustained support systems rather than one-off workshops or isolated curriculum pilots.

While the program supports work across all STEM disciplines (natural sciences, mathematics, engineering, and computer science), it explicitly elevates computing as a priority area. Computing can be included as computer science, computational thinking, computational science, or broader integration of computing into STEM instruction. At the same time, the solicitation makes clear that computing inclusion is welcome but not strictly required for every partnership project; the driving force should be the educational needs and goals of the specific partnership in advancing K-12 STEM teaching and learning. That said, the CE21 legacy within STEM C Partnerships adds several computing-focused emphases: building a stronger evidence base for how students learn computing concepts and skills, expanding rigorous computer science course offerings at the high school level, and strengthening teacher professional development and instructional capacity in computer science.

The opportunity also prioritizes scalability and modernization. Projects are encouraged to pursue models that can grow beyond a single school or district and to consider how evolving technologies, computational devices, and cyberinfrastructure can support teaching, learning, professional development, and delivery of instruction. The solicitation points toward transformative research and the practical use of that research by multiple communities, including researchers, developers, and implementers, implying that successful projects should do more than create materials; they should produce credible findings, usable tools or approaches, and pathways for broader adoption.

Equity and broadening participation are built into the program requirements rather than treated as optional add-ons. NSF expects funded partnerships to be grounded in evidence-based instructional approaches that improve outcomes for all students, with particular attention to groups historically underrepresented in STEM: women; racial and ethnic minorities including African Americans, Hispanics/Latinos, Native Americans, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians, and other Pacific Islanders; and students with disabilities. Projects are expected to demonstrate institutional commitment to these goals and to propose strategies that are supported by research or designed to contribute to the research base as part of the work.

Within this specific STEM CP CE21 solicitation, NSF describes three main award types. Broadening Participation and Education in Computing (BPEC) awards focus on building a rich knowledge base about effective computing education, especially practices that work for underrepresented students. CS 10K awards focus on developing the evidence and foundation needed to support introductory, rigorous, academic computing courses in high schools, reflecting the goal of expanding credible, standards-aligned computer science pathways at the secondary level. Computer Science Education Expansion (CSE Expansion) awards are aimed at extending the work of previously funded NSF MSP partnerships, specifically to increase the supply of qualified computer science teachers and to increase the number of high schools offering rigorous computer science courses.

From an administrative and funding standpoint, this was a discretionary NSF grant opportunity with an estimated total program funding level of $10,000,000 and an expected 26 awards. Individual award sizes were projected to range from $200,000 (award floor) to $1,000,000 (award ceiling), and the opportunity did not require cost sharing or matching funds. The CFDA program areas associated with the solicitation were 47.070 (Computer and Information Science and Engineering) and 47.076 (Education and Human Resources), reflecting the program's joint education and computing mission.

Eligibility was broad across major U.S. education and research institutions and systems, including accredited U.S. colleges and universities (two-year and four-year institutions, including community colleges), state and local government education entities such as state education offices and local school districts, and non-profit, non-academic organizations tied to education or research activities (for example, independent museums, observatories, research labs, and professional societies). The solicitation was originally posted on December 19, 2013, with a full proposal deadline of March 18, 2014, and it was later archived on April 18, 2014.

Overall, the grant opportunity is best understood as NSF's attempt to drive large, coordinated, evidence-based improvements in K-12 STEM education while explicitly strengthening the role of computing and computer science in that ecosystem. It supports partnerships that can both implement effective approaches and produce research-grade insights, with strong attention to teacher capacity, rigorous high school computer science expansion, and sustained improvements for students who have historically had less access to high-quality STEM and computing experiences.

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