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Twenty-one nonprofits and higher education institutions are receiving grants of up to $500,000 each to plan programs that offer a comprehensive range of services to help improve student outcomes, such as health care and prekindergarten.

The grants announced last week are part of the Promise Neighborhoods program, which grew out of the , a nationally recognized effort that pairs education programs with a range of supports, including classes for parents of infants and college counseling.

The planning-grant winners beat out more 330 applicants from 48 states. The grantees include a range of recipients, including medical facilities, non-profit organizations, and institutions of higher education.

Receipt of a planning grant doesn鈥檛 necessarily mean a recipient will get an implementation grant to create a Promise Neighborhood; the planning grants are aimed at helping applicants determine their communities鈥� needs and how to address them. Organizations that didn鈥檛 win one of the planning grants are still in the running to compete for broader grants aimed at actually implementing the program, once those grants are available.

鈥淭his is only the beginning of these important projects,鈥� U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said on a conference call with reporters Sept. 21. 鈥淭his is the type of business that we think our department should be doing every single year, and we鈥檙e in this for the long haul.鈥�

Hoping to Build

President Barack Obama asked for $210 million for the program in his fiscal year 2011 budget, including $200 million for implementation grants. Next year, the department is hoping to allocate another round of planning grants, plus distribute 10 to 20 implementation grants, said James H. Shelton, the department鈥檚 assistant deputy secretary for innovation and improvement.

But Congress isn鈥檛 on track to appropriate nearly as much as the administration sought. In a bill passed this summer, the House Appropriations subcommittee that oversees education spending included $60 million for the program in fiscal year 2011. The Senate Appropriations Committee included just $20 million.

鈥淚f we only get $60 million, a lot of communities will lose out,鈥� Mr. Duncan said. 鈥淲e鈥檙e going to push very, very hard on Congress to fund at that $200 million level.鈥�

The Amherst H. Wilder Foundation, of St. Paul, Minn., received a grant to help pinpoint programs to serve two inner-city neighborhoods. The foundation hopes to use the funds to help launch a public outreach campaign and finance the work of six different committees, made up of people who live in the community and who will identify ways to serve its needs, said Teri Davids, a spokeswoman for the nonprofit organization.

The organization isn鈥檛 focused on the fact that more federal funding may not be forthcoming, she said.

鈥淲e鈥檙e going to pursue some level of the program with or without the [federal] implementation grant,鈥� Ms. Davids said. 鈥淲e鈥檙e proceeding like this will be implemented one way or another.鈥�