January 2020

Each year, the PACT students “identify issues affecting peers in their schools and community, research local nonprofits, request and review grant proposals, and secure donations”. This year five interest areas
comprised their funding priorities: (1) Educational experiences that build community and foster inclusion; (2) Environmental education and sustainability; (3) Food and housing security; (4) Mental health and emotional wellness; (4) Promoting opportunity and equity across the community and the criminal justice system; and (5) Supporting survivors of domestic abuse and/or sexual assault. We felt that activities already proposed for the 2020 the Skill Share satisfied the first three priorities.

When drafting a grant proposal, I find three areas form the core, and must be included early in the process: (1) a knowledge of the grant seeking organization; (2) a well-defined concept of the activity(s) to be offered; and (3) a notional listing of the cost element required to support the activities. Karen, Deb and I all have a decent knowledge of the School of Living, though Deb certainly knows more of Turtle Way’s interests and abilities. We also felt Deb best able to propose activities that Turtle Way wanted to offer; and to begin a line item budget of expected expenses.

Following my initial direct contact with Center PACT to assure clarity on their granting process and the working of their internet interface we set to work partitioning the grant application and filling in the blanks. This was January 5th. I began work on the required organizational and primary contact information; and Deb set about identifying the workshops already under consideration for the 2020 Skill Share. Along with this Deb sketched out the Skill Share support organization and the budget, sending out a draft her thoughts before we held a Zoom call on 7th. We had until January 17th to complete and upload our proposal; and we all had schedules full of life’s other demands. It now fell to me to augment
Deb’s ideas, using my vast and intimate knowledge of writing grant proposals acquired over the last nine months of self-discovery (that’s a joke, I’m only a beginner 🙂 Fitting our working draft into the required
form, including meeting all the maximum character counts comes next. This last is one of the good reasons for developing a working draft using MS word, it’s got a character counting tool.

On January 9th I circulated the first completely formatted draft to Deb and Jaren. Deb responded with some suggestions on January 13th. These I incorporated before sending out draft two ahead of our Zoom call for a status meeting that evening. Karen also offered valuable edits, based on her more extensive experience writing grant proposals. The status call identified significant changes to the cost basis of the budget, and the pricing structure of the festival. January 13th was a focused and demanding day, but yielded the edits needed a 3rd draft that appeared close to a final version. By the 13th I also received answers from my pricing inquiries to public radio and the local newspaper. This pricing data substantiates the advertising line item in the budget, but does not become part of the proposal. Nor does it obligate Turtle Way to any particular outreach strategy. By the 14th I sent a near final draft out for last-look comments; and completed a practice cut ‘n past transfer to assure our proposal would fit the into the internet interface. All went well. We had a proposal ready to submit with three days to spare. Now we wait. By mid-April we learn if we made the cut, and receive an invitation to the in-person interview.

While this grant proposal developed smoothly and quickly by a focused team of three, most proposals do not. Finding most proposal opportunities requires extensive, time consuming searches rather than receiving a well-focused nomination. Development of most proposals take longer than a week to draft, require more iterations, more detailed information and justifications; and may rely on larger teams. While we won’t know for a month, we feel pretty confident we’re submitting a creditable proposal. We’re also confident that the processes and the experience we’re developing can be refined and reused to develop other proposals. We, as the School of Living, and as the individual communities must still learn to clearly identify potential and projects suitable for grant funding; and to find funding sources willing to support activities consistent with the School of Living’s mission and capabilities.
 

The structure is not in stone and may need refinement and, certainly, needs to be expanded. Help us by joining the conversation! You will need to sign up to reply to posts and to contribute new topics. If you would like to see additional categories; let me know and I will get them represented on the forum. MVelicky@schoolofliving.org