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 This special issue is the result of a two-year effort to identify, pilot, and publish scholarly research about the National Science Foundation’s (NSFs) broader impacts (BI) criterion and its role in community engagement as an integral part of agency-funded research projects (NSF OIA-2140950). NSF’s BI requirements reflect its intention to support research that not only pushes the boundaries of scientific knowledge, but also makes meaningful contributions to society. Participating institutions worked to build capacity in their researchers to better develop BI projects, including those that enhanced their engagement with local communities. This issue highlights the work, outcomes, and recommendations of these institutions as they explored BI resources and frameworks for building the research impact capacity of researchers and institutions. 

The Center for Advancing Research Impacts in Society (ARIS) Broader Impacts (BI) Toolkit is a collection of online, interactive tools focused on the generation of broader impacts activity plans that satisfy the criteria of proposals submitted to the National Science Foundation (NSF). The BI Toolkit includes a set of ARIS Guiding Principles, a Planning Checklist, the BI Wizard, and the BI Rubric. Over a three-year period, the ARIS BI Toolkit was pilot-tested with BI professionals located within ten institutions geographically distributed across the United States. The participating institutions represented a range of R1 and R2 institutions, Land-Grant Institutions, and Minority Serving Institutions with BI professionals serving in centralized and decentralized capacities within the institutions. This paper discusses the development of the ARIS BI Toolkit, its evolution through usability testing, a description of the BI Toolkit as it currently exists, and goals for future expansion. 

More than 27 years have passed since the National Science Board identified Broader Impacts as one of two merit criteria for National Science Foundation proposals. Yet many researchers remain less certain of how to develop, implement, and assess a broader impact plan. This multi-method study of a Broader Impacts (BI) rubric analyzed expert panels that included BI professionals and researchers for both content validity and reliability. Focus groups with researchers explicate the challenges researchers face regarding BI plans and the potential value of the rubric as a tool for use. It revealed the challenges researchers have in weighing proven strategies versus innovative strategies, a bias documented by other scholars. Researchers stated concern with how to weigh the different facets of the rubric to arrive at a single score. Moreover, researchers reported that their disciplinary field influenced how they interpreted the audiences whose needs and interests may be met through BI plans. These distinctions represent a range of different types of community engaged scholarship (e.g., public information network, community-campus partnership, K-12 schools’ partnerships). Finally, researchers found the BI rubric useful in evaluating and developing their own BI plans as well as their role in panels to ultimately strengthen the field of funded BI work.