NIJ FY23 Research and Evaluation for the Testing and Interpretation of Physical Evidence in Publicly Funded Forensic Laboratories

OJP is committed to advancing work that promotes civil rights and racial equity, increases access to justice, supports crime victims and individuals impacted by the justice system, strengthens community safety and protects the public from crime and evolving threats, and builds trust between law enforcement and the community.

With this solicitation, NIJ seeks proposals for rigorous research and evaluation projects that will:

Identify and inform the forensic community of best practices through the evaluation of existing laboratory protocols; and/or
Have a direct and immediate impact on laboratory efficiency and assist in making laboratory policy decisions.

The intent of this program is to direct the findings of this research and evaluation toward the identification of the most efficient, accurate, reliable, and cost-effective methods for the identification, analysis, and interpretation of physical evidence for criminal justice purposes. Projects should address the challenges and needs of the forensic science community, including, but not limited to, the operational needs discussed at the 2021 and 2022 TWG meetings, which may be found on NIJ.ojp.gov. NIJ's TWG assists in identifying and prioritizing operational needs and requirements of the field, which are intended to facilitate proposal development. Additional research needs of the forensic science community can be found at the Organization of Scientific Area Committees for Forensic Sciences website.

Applicants are encouraged to propose multidisciplinary research teams to build on the complementary strengths of different methods and areas of subject matter expertise. NIJ also seeks proposals that include consideration and measurement of issues of diversity, discrimination, and bias across age, gender and gender identity, race, ethnicity, religion, and sexual orientation, as applicable.

Applications proposing research involving partnerships with criminal justice or other agencies, should include a letter of support or Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), signed by an appropriate decision-making authority from each proposed, partnering agency. A letter of support or MOU should include the partnering agency's acknowledgement that de-identified data derived from, provided to, or obtained through, an award funded by NIJ will be archived by the grant recipient in accordance with their data archiving plan (see Data Archiving Plan under "Application and Submission Information") at the conclusion of the award. Applicants and their potential partners are encouraged to review NIJ's data archiving guidance. If selected for an award, grantees will be expected to have a formal agreement in place with partnering agencies by January 1, 2024. That formal agreement must include a provision to meet the data archiving requirements of the award.

NIJ seeks proposals that include robust, creative, and multi-pronged dissemination strategies that include strategic partnerships with organizations and associations that are best equipped to ensure that research findings lead to changes in policies and practices.

In the case of partnerships that will involve the use of federal award funds by multiple partnering agencies to carry out the proposed project, only one entity/partnering agency may be the applicant (as is the case with any application submitted in response to this solicitation); any others must be proposed as subrecipients. The applicant agency is expected to conduct a majority of the work proposed.