APPLICATION.

SEC. 6065. APPLICATION. (a) In General.— (1) A grant under this subchapter may be made only to a local educational agency or an educational partnership which submits an application to the Secretary containing such information as may be required by the Secretary by regulation. (2) Applications shall be for a 1-year period. (b) Contents of Application.— Each such application shall— (1) provide documentation of— (A) the number of children who were enrolled in the schools of the applicant for the 5 academic years prior to the date application is made who have not completed their elementary or secondary education and who are classified as school dropouts pursuant to section 4141(b)(5) of the Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act of 1986; and (B) the percentage that such number of children is of the total school-age population in the applicant’s schools; (2) include a plan for the development and implementation of a dropout information collection and reporting system for documenting the extent and nature of the dropout problem; (3) include a plan for coordinated activities involving at least 1 high school and its feeder junior high or middle schools and elementary schools for local educational agencies that have feeder systems; (4) include a plan for the development and implementation of a project including activities designed to carry out the purposes of this subchapter, such as— (A) implementing identification, prevention, outreach, or reentry projects for dropouts and potential dropouts; (B) addressing the special needs of school-age parents; (C) disseminating information to students, parents, and the community related to the dropout problem; 102 STAT. 1494 (D) as appropriate, including coordinated services and activities with programs of vocational education, adult basic education, and programs under the Job Training Partnership Act; (E) involving the use of educational and telecommunications and broadcasting technologies and educational materials for dropout prevention, outreach, and reentry; (F) providing activities which focus on developing occupational competencies which link job skill preparation and training with genuine job opportunities; (G) establishing annual procedures for— (i) evaluating the effectiveness of the project; and (ii) where possible, determining the cost-effectiveness of the particular dropout prevention and reentry methods used and the potential for reproducing such methods in other areas of the country; (H) coordinating, to the extent practicable, with other student dropout activities in the community; or (I) using the resources of the community and parents to help develop and implement solutions to the local dropout problem; and (5) contain such other information as the Secretary considers necessary to determine the nature of the local needs, the quality of the proposed project, and the capability of the applicant to carry out the project. (c) Priority.— The Secretary shall, in approving applications under this section, give priority to applications which both show the replication of successful programs conducted in other local educational agencies or the expansion of successful programs within a local educational agency and reflect very high numbers or very high percentages of school dropouts in the schools of the applicant in each category described in section 6064(a). (d) Special Consideration.— The Secretary shall give additional special consideration to applications that include— (1) provisions which emphasize early intervention services designed to identify at-risk students in elementary or early secondary schools; and (2) provisions for significant parental involvement.