Funding KANU Through Perkins
A step-by-step guide to funding KANU with Perkins dollars, with the exact language to write it into your plan and a Colorado program that did it.
The short version
KANU is work-based learning, and work-based learning is an allowable Perkins expense. The simplest path: write KANU into your annual Perkins spending plan as a line item. No competitive application, no grant to win. That is how the CTE team at Julesburg School District did it.
Why KANU qualifies
KANU puts students into real entrepreneurship. They launch and run actual ventures, sell to real customers, and the platform records the outcomes. That makes it work-based learning that strengthens your CTE program of study, and it maps cleanly to your Comprehensive Local Needs Assessment (CLNA) priorities. Because the spend produces verified, reportable student outcomes, it is straightforward to defend in a Perkins review.
KANU is work-based learning: students launch and run real ventures, sell to real customers, and the platform records verified outcomes that strengthen your CTE program of study and map to your CLNA priorities.
Specific allowable-use category language (partner input pending).
Defensible by design
Perkins money is well spent when the program actually gets used, and KANU is built to make that the easy outcome. The platform does the heavy lifting: guided educator onboarding, built-in training, progress tracking, and completion-based grading, so it is low lift to run. It produces the most completion and the strongest outcomes when a school embeds it as required, graded coursework with an educator guiding students, rather than offering it as optional enrichment. Easy to run, embedded to last.
That same structure is what makes the spend defensible in a review. Priced as one school-wide license rather than per student, KANU is a program-level purchase, not a resource for select individuals. And because it adds new capability rather than replacing something the school already funds, it supplements existing dollars rather than supplanting them. The result is verified-outcome evidence a Perkins review can stand on.
KANU is purchased as one school-wide license, a program-level expense rather than per student, and it adds new work-based-learning capability rather than replacing existing programming, so it supplements rather than supplants. It produces verified student outcomes that document program impact for Perkins reporting.
Need to make the case internally? Copy this and send it to your business manager or head of school.
I would like to fund KANU through our Perkins plan this year. KANU is a work-based learning platform where students run real ventures, which is an allowable Perkins expense. I am proposing we add it to our annual spending plan as a school-wide line item. It is a program-level purchase that supplements our existing programming and produces verified student outcomes we can report. A Colorado CTE program funded it the same way. Happy to walk through the details.
Two ways to fund it. Most schools use the first.
Your path
Basic Perkins
0 of 5 steps complete
Step 1 of 5: Confirm the fit
KANU supports your CLNA priorities as work-based learning.
Fit statement KANU supports our CLNA priorities as work-based learning.
Step 2 of 5: Add it to your plan
Add KANU to your annual Perkins spending plan as a line item, written in during your annual budget and CLNA planning cycle.
Example plan-line language Coming soonPartner input pending. The exact copyable language will appear here.
Step 3 of 5: Justify it
Use the allowable-use category and the supplement-not-supplant framing to justify the line.
Justification language KANU is purchased as one school-wide license, a program-level expense rather than per student, and it adds new work-based-learning capability rather than replacing existing programming, so it supplements rather than supplants. It produces verified student outcomes that document program impact for Perkins reporting.
Pending: The specific allowable-use category language is pending and will be added here once confirmed.
Step 4 of 5: Scope and quote
KANU is one price per school, school-wide. Request a quote sized to your program.
Step 5 of 5: Deploy with support
Your students start building, with a catalog mapped to your courses, educator onboarding, and progress tracking.
What it costs
KANU is priced as one license per school, school-wide. Every student and every teacher, all year. No per-seat pricing and no usage caps. Pilots are credited toward a full package, so an entry pilot is a deposit, not a discount. We scope it to your program before we quote, so the number fits what you are actually running.
Questions, answered
Specific allowable-use category (partner input pending).
Other Colorado funding paths (pending confirmation).