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NSWC Dahlgren · Department of Defense

Naval Engineering Education Consortium (NEEC) Broad Agency Announcement for Fiscal Year 2026

Opening soon

Key facts

Deadline
Opening date not announced
Award size
$100K – $450K
Match ?
Not required · Work out your budget and match
Who can apply
Private college or university, Public college or university
Where
Anywhere in the U.S., including Tennessee

Opening soon: the funder has announced this grant, but you can't apply yet. Use the time to get ready and check whether it fits.

Before you apply: federal grants require an active SAM.gov registration (Unique Entity ID) and a Grants.gov account. Registration is free but can take weeks, so start now, not when the deadline is close. Get-ready checklist

How this fits you

  • Available in Tennessee (nationwide program)
  • No match required
  • Past Tennessee awards on file: 51

Tell us who you are to see whether you're eligible.

View on Grants.gov

About this grant

This BAA is open only to colleges and universities. On behalf of the Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) Warfare Centers, NSWC DD is soliciting research of interest in support of the NEEC. The topics of interest are listed in the attached NEEC BAA FY26 Pre-Release in the related documents tab. The Pre-Release Period closed on 8/29/2025. All communication from that point forward should be sent to the Business Point of Contact at NSWCDD-CTO-ACQ@us.navy.mil until the formal Notice of Funding Opportunity is Published. During the pre-release period, topics are published with the NEEC Directors names, phone numbers, and/or email addresses. Colleges & Universities are encouraged to communicate directly with the NEEC Directors to ask technical questions to improve their understanding of a particular topic’s requirements. Once the formal Notice of Funding Opportunity is posted, direct communication between applicants and NEEC directors is no longer permitted. However, proposers may still submit written questions about the BAA topics to the NEEC Director with the Business POC on copy. Based on expected changes for grants management, the posting date for the associated Notice of Funding Opportunity is currently unknown. Once the announcement is posted, the application due date will be adjusted accordingly.

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What the official notice requires

Pulled from the official notice NEEC_BAA_26_Pre-Release_10.8.25.pdf (12 pages) so you can see the requirements at a glance. Each item shows the notice's own words. Open the page to read it in context.

Award size and project length

  • Award amounts here are per year · p. 3
    “Bryan Woosley The intent is to award ~$145K for each topic per year for a total award period of 3 years (~$435K total per award).” Open page 3

Who in Tennessee has won this program

28 awards to Tennessee groups in 4 counties since 2018. Largest shown:

Past Tennessee winners
Past winnerWhereAmountFiscal year
University of TennesseeKnoxville, Knox County$7.4M2018
University of TennesseeKnoxville, Knox County$5.2M2025
Vanderbilt UniversityNashville, Davidson County$5M2023
Collaborative Composite Solutions CorporationKnoxville, Knox County$5M2020
State of TennesseeNashville$4.9M spent that year2025
Vanderbilt UniversityNashville$2.6M spent that year2025
University of MemphisMemphis, Shelby County$2.2M2023
University of TennesseeKnoxville, Knox County$1.6M2020
Vanderbilt UniversityNashville, Davidson County$1.2M2021
Tennessee State UniversityNashville, Davidson County$1.2M2024
University of TennesseeKnoxville, Knox County$1.1M2021
Vanderbilt University Medical CenterNashville, Davidson County$849K2022

Source: USAspending.gov, Federal Audit Clearinghouse. Past awards show who this program funds. They don't guarantee future awards.

Tennessee groups that got this money through a state agency or another organization

This federal money also reaches local groups as pass-through grants. 23 pass-through grants on file. Largest shown:

Tennessee pass-through grant winners
Past winnerWhereThroughAmountFiscal year
Collaborative Composite Solutions CorporationKnoxville, Knox CountyOffice of Naval Research$2M spent that year2024
State of TennesseeNashvilleCollaborative Composite Solutions Corporation$732K spent that year2024
University of TennesseeChattanooga, Hamilton CountyGeorgia Tech Research Corporation$630K2024
Vanderbilt UniversityNashvillePrecise Systems, Inc$509K spent that year2023
State of TennesseeNashvilleOregon State University$397K spent that year2023
Vanderbilt UniversityNashville, Davidson CountyThe Pennsylvania State University$291K2026
University of MemphisMemphis, Shelby CountyVirginia Polytechnic Institute & State University$263K2026
Vanderbilt UniversityNashville, Davidson CountyRegents of the University of Minnesota$199K2026
State of TennesseeNashvilleGeorgia Institute of Technology$197K spent that year2025
State of TennesseeNashvilleStrategic Ohio Council for Higher Education$195K spent that year2024
Vanderbilt UniversityNashville, Davidson CountyThe Pennsylvania State University$194K2025
University of TennesseeKnoxville, Knox CountyUniversity of Kentucky Research Foundation, the$126K2026

Source: USAspending.gov pass-through reports (the first recipient reports each one of $30,000 or more).

About the federal program

Basic and Applied Scientific Research
Program number 12.300 (the federal Assistance Listing number) · U.S. Department of Defense, ONR · Cooperative agreement (a grant with close agency involvement), project grant

How applications are judged

Award decisions will be based on a competitive selection of proposals resulting from a scientific and cost review. Evaluations will typically be conducted using the following evaluation criteria: 1. Overall scientific and technical merits of the proposal; 2. Potential Naval relevance and contributions of the effort to the agency's specific mission; 3. The offeror's capabilities, related experience, facilities, techniques or unique combinations of these which are integral factors for achieving the proposal objectives; 4. The qualifications, capabilities and experience of the proposed Principal Investigator (PI), team leader and key personnel who are critical in achieving the proposal objectives; and 5. The realism of the proposed costs and availability of funds.

Match

None required (federal program listing).

Examples of funded projects

Fiscal year 2018: Properties and Performance of Compositionally Complex AlCrFeMn Alloys for Marine Applications Fiscal year 2019: Generalized Computations for Learning, Memory, and Decision Making in Artificial and Biological Neural Networks Fiscal year 2021: 100 drifting wave buoys were deployed in the Southern Ocean. Storms in the Southern Ocean generate energetic waves that radiate across the Pacific, Atlantic , and Indian ocean. Progress in ocean Internet of Things (IoT) technology enables the grantee to collect unprecedented data densities, which directly improves ocean and wave theories, validate and constrain ocean and atmospheric models, and provide a ground truth for satellite remote sensing data. The technology deployed by the grantee was developed with ONR sponsorship. It represents a shift in global ocean sensing toward a distributed paradigm with massive arrays of low-cost internet-connected nodes. Fiscal year 2025: Data Fusion and Assimilation for Multiscale 3D Velocity and Wall Stress Reconstructions in a Tip Gap Flow. The overarching goal of the proposed work is to advance knowledge of flow physics and cavitation inception in tip gap flow fields through the...

This program on SAM.gov

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Source: Federal grants from Grants.gov · the official federal record. Last checked by GrantMe Oct 7, 2026.

Reference numbers: official notice number N00178-26-0001 · program number 12.300