This program supports research on strategies focused on improving the use, usefulness, and impact of evidence in ways that benefit young people ages 5-25 in the United States.
Funding
Research Grants
on Improving the Use
of Research Evidence
Status:
Open
Open date:
November 12, 2025
Next Deadline:
January 7, 2026 3:00 pm EST
Awards
Introduction
Research Interests
Eligibility
Review Criteria
Research Grants on Improving the Use of Research Evidence
Awards
Major Research Grants
- $100,000 to $1,000,000 over 2-4 years, including up to 15% indirect costs.
- Studies involving secondary data analysis are at the lower end of the range (about $100,000–$300,000).
- Studies that involve new data collection can have larger budgets (typically $300,000-$600,000).
- Generally, only proposals to launch experiments in which settings (e.g., schools, child welfare agencies, justice settings) are randomly assigned to conditions are eligible for funding above $600,000.
Officers’ Research Grants
- $25,000–$50,000 over 1-2 years, including up to 15% indirect costs.
- Studies may be stand-alone projects or may build off larger projects. The budget should be appropriate for the activities proposed.
New: Applicants may submit only one application per cycle as the Principal Investigator.
In addition to financial support, the Foundation invests significant time and resources in capacity-building for research grantees. We provide opportunities to connect with other scholars, policymakers, and practitioners, and we organize learning communities that allow grantees to discuss challenges, seek advice from peers and experts, and collaborate across projects.
Introduction
Snyopsis
This program funds research studies that examine strategies to improve the use of research evidence in ways that benefit young people ages 5-25 in the United States. We seek proposals for studies that advance theory and build empirical knowledge on ways to improve the use of research evidence by policymakers, public agency leaders, organizational managers, intermediaries, community organizers, and other decision-makers that generally shape youth-serving systems in the United States.
We fund:
- Studies that build or test strategies to improve the use of existing research in policy or practice.
- Studies that test whether and how strategies that improve the use of research evidence in turn improve decision-making and youth outcomes.
We don’t fund:
- Studies that aim solely to understand how individuals and organizations access research, make sense of research findings, and apply evidence. Studies must examine a strategy to improve research use and the implications of that research use for youth outcomes.
- Studies that focus solely on improving data-driven decision-making. Studies in which data, data use, and research use intersect are welcome, however. For example, some teams have leveraged routines around data use as a strategy to embed use of research evidence. Others have engaged youth to pair data, personal narratives, and research evidence to increase school leaders’ use of research evidence.
- Studies about improving research use among frontline practitioners, at the point of service. For example, studies of strategies to improve research use among teachers, clinicians, and others in similar roles are not considered a fit. See the complete application guidelines for more information.
This year we will prioritize funding applications that:
- investigate and test strategies to improve the use of research evidence to benefit young people concerning politically charged and contested issues, particularly in highly polarized contexts. Prior studies of decision-makers’ use of research evidence during school board deliberations (Asen & Gurke, 2014), in legislative sessions (Bogenschneider, Day, & Parrott, 2019; Yanovitzky & Weber, 2020), and by advocacy coalitions (Scott et al., 2017) provide a strong evidence base for designing and studying strategies.
- propose experimental tests of strategies to improve research use in policy and practice to improve youth outcomes.
One of the most common issues in letters of inquiry is a lack of sufficient grounding in the existing empirical literature on the use of research evidence. We strongly encourage applicants to review the resources for applicants, which comprise foundational texts on the use of research evidence as well as historical and more recent work by grantees.
Overview
Research evidence can be a powerful resource for policymakers, agency leaders, organizational managers, and others who make high-stakes decisions that shape youth-serving systems. In addition to informing policy formation and service delivery, evidence from systematic research can deepen decision-makers’ understanding of issues, generate reliable assessment tools, support strategic planning, and guide program improvement. But only if it is used.
This program supports studies of strategies that aim to improve the use of research evidence in ways that benefit young people ages 5-25 in the United States. We want to know what it takes to get research used by decision-makers and what happens when research is used. And we are particularly interested in studies of strategies that are robust enough to facilitate research use in decision-making regarding divisive youth issues or in highly polarized environments. We welcome letters of inquiry for studies that pursue these broad aims.
Definitions
Strategies
Replicable methods, activities, relational approaches, or policies intended to improve the use of research evidence or to maximize its positive impact on decision-making and youth outcomes. For instance, it may include ways to create the incentives, organizational structures, and relationships needed to jointly produce, make sense of, and use research evidence in ways that respond to decision-makers’ needs and ultimately benefit youth.
Please note that proposals focusing solely on research evidence dissemination are unlikely to be successful. Recent scholarship suggests that models that prioritize passive approaches to communicating research evidence were found to have limited effectiveness (Oliver et al., 2022; Langer, Tripney & Gough, 2016).
Research evidence
A type of evidence derived from studies that apply systematic methods and analyses to address predefined questions or hypotheses. These includes descriptive studies, intervention or evaluation studies, meta-analyses, and cost-effectiveness studies conducted within or outside research organizations.
Use of research evidence
The use of research evidence refers to the multiple ways research can be used, including: applying research evidence directly to a decision (instrumental use), the influence of research evidence on decision-makers’ understanding of problems and potential solutions (conceptual use), supporting existing stances or positions (strategic use), building trust with colleagues or educating constituents (relational use) or mandating decision-makers to engage with research (imposed use).
Decision-makers
Those who create policies or make other high-level decisions that shape practice in youth-serving systems. Decision-makers include but are not limited to individuals, groups, or agencies with formal policymaking or policy implementation authority (e.g., school district leaders, state child welfare agency managers, county legislators, etc.); advocates who influence policymaking or policy implementation; community leaders; or intermediaries such as professional associations (e.g., National Conference of State Legislatures, Council of Great City Schools, etc.) that provide information, consultation, and technical assistance to inform their members’ decision-making.
Research Interests
This program supports research on strategies focused on improving the use, usefulness, and impact of research evidence in ways that benefit young people ages 5-25 in the United States. We welcome impact studies that test strategies for improving research use as well as whether improving research use leads to improved youth outcomes. We also welcome descriptive studies that reveal the strategies, mechanisms, or conditions for improving research use. Finally, we welcome measurement studies that explore how to construct and implement valid and reliable measures of research use.
We are particularly interested in research on ways to improve the use of research evidence by state and local policymakers, mid-level managers, leaders in community organizations, and intermediaries. These decision-makers play important roles in deciding which programs, practices, and tools to adopt; deliberating ways to improve existing services; shaping the conditions for implementation; and making resource allocation decisions.
We invite studies from a range of disciplines, fields, and methods, and we encourage investigations into various youth-serving systems, including justice, housing, child welfare, mental health, K-12 and higher education.
Previous studies have drawn on conceptual and empirical work from political science, communication science, knowledge mobilization, implementation science, and organizational psychology, among other areas.
Finally, we welcome critical perspectives that inform studies’ framing, research questions, methods, and interpretation of findings.
We welcome studies that pursue one of two aims:
Building or testing ways to improve the use of existing research evidence in policy or practice.
This may include:
- Studies of strategies, mechanisms, or conditions that foster more routine and constructive uses of existing research evidence by decision-makers.
- Studies to examine the relationships and organizational structures that lead to the prioritization of decision-makers’ needs in developing research agendas.
- Studies that examine ways to optimize organized collaborations among researchers, decision-makers, intermediaries, and other stakeholders to benefit youth.
- For example, prior work suggests that decision-makers often lack the institutional resources and some of the requisite skills to seek out and use research, and certain organizational norms and routines can help overcome those barriers. Studies might examine efforts to alter the decision-making environment by comparing the effectiveness of different ways (e.g., technical assistance, research-practice partnerships, cross-agency teams, etc.) to connect existing research with decision-makers.
Testing whether and how strategies that improve the use of research evidence in turn improve decision-making and youth outcomes.
This may include:
- Studies that examine the impact of research use on youth outcomes and the conditions under which using research evidence improves outcomes.
- The notion that using research will improve youth outcomes is a long-standing assumption, but there is little evidence to validate it. We suspect that the impact of research on outcomes may depend on a number of conditions, including the quality of the research and the quality of research use. One hypothesis is that the quality of the research and the quality of research use will work synergistically to yield strong outcomes for youth.
- Studies to test other conditions under which using research evidence improves youth outcomes.
- For example, recent federal policies have instituted mandates and incentives to increase the adoption of programs with evidence of effectiveness from randomized controlled trials, with the expectation that the use of these programs will lead to better outcomes. Do these policies actually increase the use of those programs and improve youth outcomes? In this example, a proposal would need to use theory and related empirical evidence to motivate the potential of the evidence mandate to improve research use and the connection between improved use of research and improved youth outcomes. More generally, whether or not the study includes measures of youth outcomes, the connection between improved use of research among decision-makers and improved youth outcomes needs to be well-described.
- Studies that examine the impact of research use on youth outcomes and the conditions under which using research evidence improves outcomes.
These research interests call for a range of methods, including experimental or observational research designs, comparative case studies, or systematic reviews.
- Where appropriate, consider using existing methods, measures, and analytic tools for assessing research use so that your findings can be compared and aggregated across studies (see Gitomer and Crouse [2019] Studying the Use of Research Evidence: A Review of Methods).
- Existing measures may not be well-suited for some inquiries, so you may also propose to adapt existing measures or develop new ones. We strongly encourage applicants to utilize a new open-access methods and measures repository that shares existing protocols for collecting and analyzing data on research use
- Mixed methods studies that collect and integrate multiple types of data may be particularly advantageous given the difficulty of relying solely on self-report methods to study evidence use in complex deliberations and decision-making contexts.
Eligibility
Eligible Organizations
- The Foundation makes grants only to tax-exempt organizations. We do not make grants to individuals.
- We encourage proposals from organizations that are under-represented among grantee institutions, including Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Hispanic-serving Institutions, Tribal Colleges and Universities, Alaska Native-Serving Institutions, Native Hawaiian-Serving Institutions, and Asian American Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institutions.
Eligible Principal Investigators
- The Foundation defers to the applying organization’s criteria for who is eligible to act as a Principal Investigator or Co-Principal Investigator on a grant. In general, we expect that all investigators will have the experience and skills to carry out the proposed work.
- We strive to support a diverse group of researchers in terms of race, ethnicity, gender, and seniority, and we encourage research projects led by Black or African American, Indigenous, Latinx, and/or Asian or Pacific Islander American researchers.
- New for 2026: Please note that you may only submit one application per cycle as the Principal Investigator. For example, you may submit only one major grant or one Officers’ research award letter of inquiry.
Eligible Studies
- Only studies that 1) align with the stated research interests of this program and 2) relate to the outcomes of young people between the ages of 5 and 25 in the United States are eligible for consideration.
- We do not support non-research activities such as program implementation and operational costs, or make contributions to building funds, fundraising drives, endowment funds, general operating budgets, or scholarships. Applications for ineligible projects are screened out without further review.
Review Criteria
All letters of inquiry are initially reviewed by a set of reviewers with relevant expertise. In general, however, given the breadth of studies proposed in letters of inquiry, reviewers may lack deep knowledge of an applicant’s specific area of work, so avoid disciplinary jargon and use language appropriate for an educated lay audience.
We begin application reviews by looking at the importance of research questions or hypotheses. Then we evaluate whether the proposed research designs and methods will provide strong empirical evidence on those questions.
For major research grants applications, based on review of the letter of inquiry, the Foundation either invites a full proposal for further consideration, or declines the application. We do not accept unsolicited full proposals. Officers’ research grants are awarded on the merit of the letter of inquiry alone.
The letter of inquiry functions as a mini-proposal and is reviewed against the following criteria:
- Fit with Research Interests
- The proposed study aligns with this program’s research interests and pursues one of two aims:
- Building or testing ways to improve the use of existing research evidence in policy or practice.
- Testing whether and how strategies that improve the use of research evidence in turn improve decision-making and youth outcomes.
- The proposed study relates to the outcomes of young people between the ages of 5 and 25 in the United States.
- The proposed study aligns with this program’s research interests and pursues one of two aims:
- Conceptualization and Relevance
- The letter of inquiry reflects a mastery of relevant theory and empirical findings.
- The letter of inquiry provides a clear operational definition of the use of research evidence for the purposes of the proposed project.
- The letter of inquiry states the theoretical and empirical contributions the study will make to the existing research base.
- The letter of inquiry discusses how the findings will be relevant to policy or practice.
- Methods
- The proposed study employs rigorous methods (quantitative, qualitative, or mixed) that are commensurate to its goals.
- The study’s design, methods, and analysis plan fit the proposed research questions.
- The description of the research design makes clear how the empirical work will test, refine, or elaborate specific theoretical notions.
- Quantitative analyses might emphasize hypotheses and plans for testing them, while qualitative analyses might elaborate on how the research will illuminate processes underlying specific programs, policies, or practices.
- Plans for case selection, sampling, and measurement clearly state why they are well-suited to address the research questions or hypotheses.
- For example, samples must be appropriate in size and composition to answer the study’s questions. Qualitative case selection—whether critical, comparative, or otherwise—must also be appropriate to answer the proposed questions.
- The quantitative and/or qualitative analysis plan demonstrates awareness of the strengths and limits of the specific analytic techniques and how they will be applied in the current case.
- If proposing mixed methods, plans for integrating the methods and data are clear and compelling.
- If proposing quantitative methods, the letter of inquiry demonstrates that the study will have adequate statistical power to detect meaningful effects.
- The letter of inquiry demonstrates adequate consideration of the gender, ethnic, and cultural appropriateness of concepts, methods, and measures.
- Feasibility
- The proposed methods, time frame, staffing plan, and other resources are realistic.
- The letter of inquiry assures that data will be successfully collected, describes the team’s prior experience collecting such data, and identifies strategies for maximizing response rates and access to data sources.
- Prior training and publications demonstrate that the research team has a track record of conducting strong research and communicating it successfully.
- Be sure to demonstrate that the research team is well-positioned to address the varied tasks demanded by the study’s conceptualization and research design. This might include combining expertise across disciplines or methods.
- Be specific about the value of each member’s contributions to the team. We strongly discourage teams that comprise many senior investigators for very limited time and effort or otherwise make cursory nods to multi-disciplinary or mixed-role project teams. Instead, clearly justify the unique value of each team member and the specific role each will play in different stages of the project.
Where appropriate, we value projects that:
- Harness the learning potential of mixed methods and interdisciplinary work.
- Involve practitioners or policymakers in meaningful ways to shape the research questions, interpret preliminary and final results, and communicate their implications for policy and practice.
- Combine senior and junior staff in ways that facilitate mentoring of junior staff.
- Are led by members of racial or ethnic groups underrepresented in academic fields.
- Generate data useful to other researchers and make such data available for public use.
- Demonstrate significant creativity and potential to advance the field, for example by introducing new research paradigms or extending existing methods, measures and analytic tools to allow for comparison across studies.
