Federal funds to disseminate information about a charter school are available through two programs: the Charter Schools Program State Educational Agency and the Charter Schools Non-State Educational Agency Dissemination grants programs (84.282A and 84.282C).

A charter school may apply for dissemination funds whether or not the charter school has previously applied for or received funds for planning, program design, or implementation.

Any school applying for funds must have been in operation for at least 3 consecutive years and must have demonstrated overall success, including:

• Substantial progress in improving student academic achievement;
• High levels of parent satisfaction; and
• The management and leadership necessary to overcome initial start-up problems and establish a thriving, financially viable charter school.

Charter schools may use dissemination grant funds: (1) to assist other schools in adapting the charter school's program (or certain aspects of the charter school's program), or (2) to disseminate information about the charter school, through such activities as:

• Assisting other individuals with the planning and start-up of one or more new public schools, including charter schools, that are independent of the assisting charter school and the assisting charter school’s developers, and that agree to be held to at least as high a level of accountability as the assisting charter school;
• Developing partnership with other public schools, including charter schools, designed to improve student achievement in each of the schools participating in the partnership;
• Developing curriculum materials, assessments, and other materials that promote increased student achievement and are based on successful practices within the assisting charter school; and
• Conducting evaluations developing materials that document the successful practices of the assisting charter school and that are designed to improve student performance in other schools.

Whether a charter school is eligible for dissemination funds and where that school should apply for funds depends on the location of the charter school. The information provided below was last updated in January 2013.

Apply for State Education Agency (SEA) Dissemination Money

Charter schools in states that currently are receiving funds under the State Education Agency grant competition are required to apply directly to their state educational agency for dissemination money. Contact the person for your state listed at the bottom of this page under Funding Contacts.

Ineligible for Federal Charter School Dissemination Grants

Charter schools in the following states are NOT eligible to apply for dissemination grants. Their states received federal SEA funding but elected not to participate in the dissemination program.

Consider the Non-SEA Dissemination Competition

If an individual charter school is located in a state that has a law authorizing charter schools but does not receive an SEA grant, the charter school may be eligible to compete for a direct federal grant under the Non-SEA Dissemination Competition. Applicants for this competition should contact the U.S. Department of Education's Charter Schools Program directly at charterschools@ed.gov.

*Maine and Washington are not currently eligible to receive federal dissemination grant funds because laws in these two states allowing the creation of charter schools were not approved until 2011 and 2012 respectively. As previously noted, the federal dissemination grant criteria require charter schools to operate for at least three consecutive years before they are eligible for dissemination funds.

No Charter School Laws

The following states do not have charter laws and so are ineligible to receive CSP funds:

Funding Contacts for Dissemination Grants

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