With this Dear Colleague Letter (DCL) NSF 20-100, the National Science Foundation (NSF) wishes to notify the community that research projects focused on pandemics are considered appropriate for the Civic Innovation Challenge (CIVIC; NSF 20-562), a research and action competition in the smart and connected communities (S&CC) domain.

Additionally, NSF wishes to notify the community of broadened NSF support for CIVIC. Together with the NSF directorates and federal partners listed in the solicitation – NSF’s directorates for Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE) and Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences (SBE), the U.S. Department of Energy’s Vehicles Technologies Program, and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Directorate – NSF’s division of Civil, Mechanical and Manufacturing Innovation (CMMI) within its directorate for Engineering (ENG) is now also supporting CIVIC.

NSF launched CIVIC earlier this spring with the goals of (i) flipping the community-university dynamic, with communities identifying civic priorities ripe for innovation and then partnering with researchers to address those priorities; (ii) accelerating the impact of S&CC research; and (iii) deepening cooperation and information sharing across sectors and regions.

CIVIC is organized as a two-stage competition with two tracks. One track is centered on resilience to natural disasters and calls for research that equips communities with greater preparedness and resilience to natural disasters. The other track is centered on communities and mobility and calls for research that addresses better mobility options to solve the spatial mismatch between housing affordability and jobs, as well as associated mobility solutions that can increase access to critical services and amenities that foster healthy and thriving communities.

You can find the complete announcement here.