Charter Schools Program Grants to Charter Management Organizations for the Replication and Expansion of High-Quality Charter Schools (CMO Grants)

What’s New

On March 14, 2022, the U.S. Department of Education published in the Federal Register the Notice of Proposed Priorities, Requirements, Definitions, and Selection Criteria–Expanding Opportunity Through Quality Charter School Programs (CSP)-Grants to State Entities (SE Grants); Grants to Charter Management Organizations for the Replication and Expansion of High-Quality Charter Schools (CMO Grants); and Grants to Charter School Developers for the Opening of New Charter Schools and for the Replication and Expansion of High-Quality Charter Schools (Developer Grants).  The deadline for public comments was April 13, 2022.  We received over 25,000 public comments, which can be viewed on the Federal eRulemaking Portal at www.regulations.gov.

On July 6, 2022, the Department published in the Federal Register the Notice of Final Priorities, Requirements, and Selection Criteria (NFP), which can be accessed here.  An accompanying CSP Fact Sheet can be accessed here.

For information about CMO Grants competitions, please monitor this page and the Department’s Forecast of Funding Opportunities page here.  For information about previous awards, please visit the Awards page.

Program Description

The major purposes of the CSP are to:

• expand opportunities for all students, particularly traditionally underserved students, to attend charter schools and meet challenging State academic standards;
• provide financial assistance for the planning, program design, and initial implementation of public charter schools;
• increase the number of high-quality charter schools available to students across the United States;
• evaluate the impact of charter schools on student achievement, families, and communities;
• share best practices between charter schools and other public schools;
• encourage States to provide facilities support to charter schools; and
• support efforts to strengthen the charter school authorizing process.

The purpose of the CMO grant program is to support charter schools that serve early childhood, elementary school, or secondary school students by providing grant funds to eligible applicants for the replication and expansion of high-quality charter schools (84.282M).