After considering the 10 Questions and reviewing the general guidelines in Writing the Grant, consider the following additional suggestions.
Carefully evaluate the need your project seeks to impact, and how many students, staff or parents your plan will affect. The district’s Development office will provide support at any point. Contact the Development Coordinator, Susan D. Pardee (397-3869) or [email protected].
Contact the funder you have targeted, describe your project and make sure it is in line with their guidelines. Funders’ guidelines change – you don’t want to waste time pursuing an opportunity that no longer exists! Funders can also guide you in how and what to write to create the most successful proposal for their foundation.
Use research to support your assertions: quantitative evidence (numbers such as proficiency scores, diagnostic test data or number of behavior referrals); leavened with some anecdotal evidence (individual stories that illustrate).
Plan a reasonable timeline for the project – something you can accomplish in addition to your myriad other duties during the school year. Give a great deal of thought to the evaluation – how you will determine whether you have reached your goal and impacted the need you expressed. Finally, detail how this project can be continued without foundation funding in the future.
Reasonable Expectations
After all the thought, discussion and writing, what is it reasonable to expect?
Searching for grant funding is work!
This is not “easy” money. The grant process is competitive – you are competing for scarce resources, limited funds that many are seeking. Many successful grants are submitted more than once after being rejected initially. However, there is reason for optimism:
The process of thinking through the project or program idea and writing it for submission focuses the project.
Once the original grant submission has been written, it can be amended and submitted elsewhere, perhaps where there is a better “fit” for the project.
If full funding is not found, the project can sometimes be divided into smaller units and parts of the program can be implemented through other means.