Emergency Memo

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION

July 1, 2022
MEMORANDUM
TO:
FROM:

Lindsay Abate and Shagufta Ahmed
Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs
Office of Management and Budget
James Lane
Senior Advisor, Office of the Secretary
Delegated the Authority to Perform the Functions and Duties of the
Assistant Secretary Office of Elementary and Secondary Education

RE:

Emergency Request for Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) approval

Pursuant to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) procedures established at 5 CFR
1320, the U.S. Department of Education (Department) requests the following collection of
information to be collected from State Entities (SE) (State Educational Agencies, Charter
School Support Organizations, Governors, State Charter School Boards, and Charter
School Management Organizations) and charter school developers that receive funds under
the Charter Schools Program (CSP) Grant Programs, Grants to State Entities (SE Grants),
Grants to Charter School Management Organizations for the Replication and Expansion of
High-Quality Charter Schools (CMO Grants), and Grants to Charter School Developers for
the Replication and Expansion of High-Quality Charter Schools (Developer Grants) be
processed in accordance with section 1320.13 Emergency Processing.
On March 14, 2022, the Department published in the Federal Register (87 FR 14197) a
notice of proposed priorities related to these CSP grant programs. We take this action to
ensure that Federal CSP funds support the creation, replication, and expansion of highquality charter schools that promote positive student outcomes, student and staff diversity,
educator and community empowerment, promising practices, and accountability. We also
seek to promote greater fiscal transparency and accountability for CSP-funded charter
schools. We believe the policies and strategies reflected in this regulatory action can serve
as a model for all charter schools.
SE Grants allow SEs to award subgrants to eligible applicants to support opening new
charter schools and replicating and expanding high-quality charter schools. SEs also may
use grant funds for administration and to provide technical assistance to eligible applicants
and authorizers. CMO Grants provide funding to Charter Management Organizations
(CMOs) to enable them to replicate and expand high-quality charter schools. Developer
Grants provide funding to charter school developers in states that do not have an active SE
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The Department of Education’s mission is to promote student achievement and preparation for global competitiveness by
fostering educational excellence and ensuring equal access.

Grant to support opening new charter schools and replicating and expanding high-quality
charter schools.
The CSP SE Grants and Developer Grants programs timeline is extremely short due to the
Biden Administration’s direction to the Department to create regulations to promote
positive student outcomes, student and staff diversity, educator and community
empowerment, promising practices, and accountability. The Notice of Proposed Priorities
comment window was extended because of stakeholder feedback, and there were 26,588
comments received. Based on the number of comments that the Department needs to
respond to the analysis took longer than usual. For these reasons, we request emergency
approval of the CSP SE Grant, CMO Grant, and Developer Grant applications so that SEs,
CMOs, and developers can demonstrate their eligibility and need to implement the
program as intended and receive funds to address the needs of their students, staff, schools,
and communities.
The application will be made available as soon as the notices inviting applications and
notice of final priorities are published. We intend to publish the NIAs and NFP on July 6,
2022, and therefore request approval of the applications on July 5, 2022. If this emergency
collection is not approved, the Department will not be able to carry out the Biden
Administration’s direction to the Department and to ensure needed resources are available
to SEs, CMOs, and developers to immediately address related needs of each grant program.
A delay in the approval of this ICR could prevent the Department from making awards
prior to the end of the fiscal year, thus making us unable to award the funds.
We anticipate that approximately 65 applicants will respond to the Developer, CMO, and
SE competitions, and that an additional 300 subgrant applicants will submit SE subgrants
applications. We also estimate that the application template will take approximately 60
hours for each applicant to complete.
In order to provide applicants adequate time to submit their applications and to ensure that
awards are made prior to the end of the fiscal year, the Department requests a six-month
emergency approval of this ICR timed with the publication of the notices inviting
applications and notice of final priority. The Department will publish a notice in the
Federal Register providing for 30 days of public comment as part of our request for regular
ICR approval.