Supports research on how forensic science operates as a system — how evidence is generated and used, how policies affect outcomes, and how emerging technology changes practice. Best for interdisciplinary academic teams.
Apply directly on grants.gov, no state intermediary. This is research funding: universities, nonprofits, companies and state, local or tribal governments are eligible, and projects often study how labs and forensic systems work.
Official program pageBroad multi-sector eligibility including government, universities, nonprofits, and businesses per the NOFO. Interdisciplinary teams linking forensic practice with criminology, economics, and policy are well-suited.
FY2025: 29 applications received, no awards made yet.
Round totals: DOJ Office of Justice Programs award data. Award lists: USAspending.gov, plus DOJ’s own award list for rounds USAspending is missing.
General advice for this program, not taken from the notice. The notice’s own review criteria are what reviewers actually score, so check these against it.
Collaborate with a university criminology or social science department to co-design your evaluation methodology, as NIJ prioritizes rigorous empirical research frameworks that forensic labs rarely develop independently. Include a named co-investigator with peer-reviewed publication history in forensic science evaluation.
Explicitly map your proposed outcome measures to NIJ's published priorities such as reducing wrongful convictions, improving turnaround times, or validating emerging forensic methods using quantifiable, pre-registered benchmarks. Reference NIJ's Forensic Science Research and Development Program strategic objectives by name in your narrative.
Do not submit proposals that focus solely on purchasing equipment, processing backlogs, or routine casework improvement, as this CFDA specifically funds social science evaluation and research rather than operational forensic capacity building. Reviewers will immediately flag proposals lacking a rigorous social science research design.
Do not describe your evaluation plan in general terms such as 'we will assess effectiveness' without specifying control groups, comparison conditions, data collection instruments, and statistical analysis methods. NIJ peer reviewers score scientific rigor heavily, and an underspecified methodology is the most common reason for low scores on this program.
A starting list, not the official one. Each notice ends with its own application checklist, and that is the list to work from once a round opens.
