Grantsmanship
An Exercise in Becoming Successful in
Funding your Own Classroom
Monday, June 25, 2012
Why Bother?
• Statistics in your favor
• Professionalism
• Control
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Summer Time-Line
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Monday, June 25
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Tuesday, June 26
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Identify target funding source(s) and deadlines – download forms
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Outline need, goals and objectives
Wednesday, June 27
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Outline project activities
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Identify budget items
Thursday, June 28
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Introduction/discuss project ideas
Specify outcomes to be measured/evaluation process
Friday, June 29
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Final review/editing/polishing of proposal outline
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Brass Tacks
(as in, getting down to)
• Developing the proposal idea
– Defining clear goals and objectives
– Writing a compelling need
statement – “TELL YOUR
STORY”
• Identify outcomes and evaluation
•June Three
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Planning
• Start Small, Think Big
• Develop your skills/confidence by targeting
small awards ($300-500)
• Plan from outset for a project that can
grow/span for than a single year
• Use your evaluation data to revise
plans/support your argument for additional
funding/new grant
• Establish Time-line/Think Ahead
• Six-nine month lead time not unreasonable
• Many Spring deadlines
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Pathways
• Identifying an idea
• Selfish-How will $ help my
classroom?
• Broader need-What other
program/learning goal will be
advanced?
• Who is most likely to send $ my
way?
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Partners
• Planning
• Editing
• Execution
• Evaluation – Your Data
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Setting the Stage
• Decisions
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Grant=Innovation=Change
Timing
80/20 rule (Pareto Principle)
Pathways and Partners
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Pareto Principle
• AKA the 80/20 Rule.
• 20% of a grant-writer’s activities are responsible for 80%
of the results.
– Your highest value “20%” boils down to telling your
story.
– Your story is the glue holding the proposal together.
– Your story provides the basis for your individual giving.
– Your story is what writes your website copy.
– Your story isn’t your mission statement. It’s not the
937 high school students you serve.
– Your story isn’t even “The Story,” for you’ll never have
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Relevance
• So, how you can better communicate your message?
– Doesn’t needs to be more complex than it really is. You don’t
need to take a “storytelling” seminar or learn a lot of jargon.
• Another way to think about 80/20
– Devote ~80% of the time/effort in writing a proposal to project
design and planning.
– The last 20% is devoted to writing the proposal.
• You cannot write a competitive proposal without
devoting the 80% in design and planning.
Do not write until you have planned!
(From: http://www.gea.gsu.edu/Grants/grant_writing.html
)
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Strategies-Proposal Idea
• In your classroom
• Identify problem areas
• Lack of inquiry-based activities
• Poorly motivated students
• After-school efforts
• School-site
• Build science division
• Joint projects/teacher partners
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Strategies-Need Statement
• Become familiar with national/local initiatives
• Develop “short-list” of agencies to target
• Adapt/adopt project goals to align
• Use “buzz-words” (examples easy to access)
• Inquiry-based
• Contemporary
• Partner
• Perform polls/quantitate deficiencies
• Test scores
• Questionnaires
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• Dream “yume”
• From: www.pacificakido.org
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