The U.S. National Science Foundation is accepting proposals under NSF 24-584, Advanced Technological Education (ATE), a national program supporting technician education in advanced science and engineering fields with a central focus on two-year institutions.
Deadline
The next full proposal deadline is October 1, 2026 at 5:00 PM in the submitting organization’s local time.
Award Tracks
Track 1 Small Scale Projects: up to $475,000, typically over three years. Track 2 Projects: up to $1,000,000 over up to three years. Track 3 Consortia for Innovations in Technician Education: $1.2 million to $3 million, typically over three to four years depending on consortium size. Track 4 ATE Centers: $7.5 million over five years, with a possible competitive renewal.
Voluntary committed cost sharing is prohibited.
Eligibility and Two-Year College Leadership
Eligible proposer types include U.S. two- and four-year institutions of higher education, qualifying U.S. nonprofit nonacademic research and education organizations, U.S.-based for-profit commercial organizations including small businesses, state and local governments, and federally recognized Tribal Nations. Two-year institutions and their faculty must have significant leadership roles on every ATE project. When another type of organization serves as fiscal lead, two-year IHE faculty must be identified as Co-PIs. Track 3 consortia must be led by a two-year IHE.
Material Restriction
ATE does not support projects focused on students who will become health, veterinary, or medical technicians. Atlas relevance is therefore limited to responsive non-health STEM technician education, including areas such as advanced manufacturing, agricultural and biotechnology applications, energy and environmental technology, engineering technologies, information technology and cybersecurity, geospatial technology, autonomous systems, artificial intelligence, quantum information science, and other qualifying advanced technology fields.
Submission and Application Controls
Full proposals may be submitted through Research.gov or Grants.gov. Separately submitted collaborative proposals must use Research.gov. The Project Description is limited to 15 pages and must address the required rationale, goals, objectives, deliverables, activities, timetable, management, sustainability, evaluation, and dissemination elements. Required partner Letters of Collaboration must describe specific roles and contributions.
Equipment and instrumentation must be essential to the project and are normally limited to $300,000 for the duration of a full project grant, subject to the solicitation’s stated exceptions and justification requirements. Routine teaching costs, ordinary laboratory upgrades, common instructional equipment, and facility construction or renovation are not supported.
Atlas Fit
This is a strong national school and workforce-education opportunity for eligible two-year colleges and compliant partners, but it is not a healthcare-technician funding path. The preferred structure is Partner-Led. A Dr. Miltie/QC role should be considered only within a responsive project with verified two-year IHE leadership and must not be framed around health, veterinary, or medical technician education.