Prepared by: Shellie Dolan
Shellie Dolan serves as Director of Grants in McAllister and Quinn’s Higher Education Practice. She provides guidance, technical advice, and professional grant writing for clients to pursue external funding opportunities, overseeing grant proposal development from initial concept to submission. Her work has included securing federal funding for community colleges serving disadvantaged and underrepresented student populations. Read more about Shellie.
This federally Funded program can provide community colleges with funding to help grow long-term capacity and stability and improve student outcomes by helping institutions establish sustainable programs that have impact long beyond the grant period. Title III is one of the most effective federal capacity‑building programs, and Congress reaffirmed bipartisan support for this program in the FY26 federal budget signed into law on February 13, 2026.
The last SIP competition was held in 2023, with 38 community and technical colleges awarded Title III SIP funds (two distributed from a combined State University of New York [SUNY] award), comprising 34% of the total new awards made that year. In previous years, the percentage of total Title III SIP higher education funding directed toward two-year institutions has been as high as 60%.
Two-year institutions typically enroll disproportionately high numbers of low-income students, with 57% having household incomes below 200% of the federal poverty level (compared to 42-46% at four-year institutions), making them particularly competitive for SIP funding.
Title III SIP is a competitive grant that provides funding for eligible colleges and universities to strengthen academic quality, institutional management, and fiscal stability, particularly for institutions serving high numbers of low‑income students.
- Estimated number of awards: 600
- Award and Duration:
Up to $3,000,000 over 5 years for Individual Development Grants
Up to $5,000,000 over 5 years for Cooperative Arrangement Development Grants)
Changes Impacting Title III Funding in 2026
ED and DOL announced that the agencies will make a historic, one-time investment in the Fiscal Year (FY) 2026 competition for the Strengthening Institutions Program. Estimated available Title III SIP funding is currently $365,875,512, far exceeding its previous funding level of $127.5M in 2023. This new competition includes options to support workforce readiness, advance the responsible use of artificial intelligence (AI), and help institutions develop high-quality, short-term programs ahead of the implementation of the new Workforce Pell Grant program. McAllister & Quinn is working on an in-depth analysis of the new competition and changes that will be available on in the coming days.
Increased Community College Funding Improves Student Outcomes
Community colleges serve students with more significant needs but with fewer resources than public or private four-year institutions of higher education, receiving less than half the education-related revenue per student at public four-year colleges ($8,700 compared to $17,500).
A degree or certificate from a community college can have significant, positive impact on economic mobility for low-income students and their communities, but insufficient supports limited by chronic underfunding of two-year institutions can contribute to low retention and graduation rates for these vulnerable students. In a survey of community college students who stopped out, 46% cited institutional barriers, despite the best efforts of dedicated faculty and support personnel. Increased community college funding has consistently been shown to eliminate some of the negative outcomes experienced by students, so an award from the SIP program can be truly transformative for institutions, students, and communities.
What Title III SIP Funds Can Do for Your Institution
SIP funds can help community and technical colleges hire personnel, invest in infrastructure (e.g. retention enterprise systems), make capital improvements, or launch innovative enrollment management solutions. Institutions have used SIP funds to establish or enhance student support centers and personnel, provide professional development, hire faculty or staff, and increase endowments. Successful budget requests have included funds for academic supports such as tutoring, supplemental instruction, and course creation or revision, as well as basic skills-building programs, financial literacy instruction, enhanced placement tools, improved advising and academic coaching, and myriad other approaches to improving student outcomes and increasing institutional capacity. The program can fund a broad range of requests that can be otherwise difficult to obtain external support for, particularly capital improvements and retention data systems, making SIP a critical federal funding opportunity for low-income students and the institutions that support them.
Preparing for a Competitive Title III SIP Proposal in 2026
Title III SIP proposals require a detailed planning, commitment from leadership, and a comprehensive development plan (CDP) that uses an analysis of institutional data to support relevant, evidence-based interventions and provide metrics for goals and objectives. This is a highly competitive but accessible program, and with a compressed timeline, institutions that have been preparing can move forward now with a clear advantage.
Community Colleges Win Title III SIP Awards
Title III grants are highly competitive, often funding fewer than 20% of submitted applications. McAllister & Quinn clients have been awarded Title III grants at a much higher rate, and our strategic client partnerships have resulted in over $60M in total Title III SIP funding for colleges and universities.
McAllister and Quinn Can Help You Prepare
If your institution is considering a Title III application this cycle or is repurposing an FY2025 Title V Developing Hispanic Serving Populations project, our team is ready to help you develop and complete a competitive and compelling proposal that aligns with federal priorities and your strategic goals. McAllister & Quinn offers a Title III Coaching and Proposal Development Service designed to help your institution refine strategy and execute under a compressed timeline. We can help position to compete for federal grants for community colleges with confidence and optimize the probability of a successful proposal. Our Title III SIP coaching package is designed to help your team move quickly from concept development through submission.
