Program Announcement: Social and Behavioral Context for Academic Learning CFDA 84.305A

Program Officer:
Dr. Emily Doolittle
Emily.Doolittle@ed.gov
(202) 219-1201

Purpose

Through its Social and Behavioral Context for Academic Learning (Social/Behavioral) research program, the Institute supports research on interventions designed to improve social skills and behaviors that support academic and other important school-related outcomes (e.g. attendance, high school graduation rates) in typically developing students from kindergarten through high school. Under this research grant program, the Institute will fund research to (1) explore malleable factors¹ (e.g., children's skills, classroom management practices, professional development programs) that are associated with better social skills and behaviors that support academic learning, as well as mediators and moderators of the relations between these factors and student outcomes, for the purpose of identifying potential targets of intervention; (2) develop innovative programs and practices for improving social skills and behaviors that support academic learning; (3) evaluate fully developed programs and practices for improving social skills and behaviors that support academic learning through efficacy or replication trials; (4) evaluate the impact of programs and practices for improving social skills and behaviors that support academic learning that are implemented at scale; and (5) develop and validate measures of teacher classroom management practices and child social skills and behaviors that support learning in school.

The long-term outcome of this program will be an array of tools and strategies (e.g. assessment tools and behavioral interventions) that have been documented to be effective for improving or assessing social skills and behaviors that support academic and other important school-related outcomes of students from kindergarten through high school.