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March 31, 2009

Association of Fundraising Professionals
Advice for Grant Seekers

Opportunities for new grants lurk in some unexpected places, said Gail Vertz, executive director of the American Association of Grant Professionals, at a session today at the annual meeting of the Association of Fundraising Professionals conference in New Orleans.

For example, she says, one place for grant seekers to check out is their local bank. Often family foundations that don’t want to oversee the foundation will appoint a bank vice president to manage it. When visiting a bank, she suggests, charity officials should check to see if anyone there is a contact person for a foundation, and should always be prepared to give a quick, concise speech about their organization’s mission and needs.

Similarly, she says, it pays to stay in touch with foundation program officers, who can sometimes tell you if new money becomes available because another grantee is unable to use it.

As a grant reviewer, Ms. Vertz says one of the weaknesses she sees most often on grant applications is a budget that doesn’t match up with program descriptions.

“If you’re putting in staff time and you say you’re getting half of your case manager’s or social worker’s time, make sure it’s easy to see that someone is spending 20 hours on a project,” she says.

Otherwise, grant makers are likely to give an application a low score and may not award it any money.

Ms. Vertz said she is also irked by line items marked “miscellaneous” on grant-application budgets. “If somebody can’t tell me how they’re going to spend that money, that’s inappropriate,” she said. “You should be able to explain everything you plan on doing.”

She recommends including an evaluation component that describes how a program’s results will be measured and how that will be reported to the grant maker – even if the foundation doesn’t seek such details. That will demonstrate the charity’s seriousness about making a difference.

Most federal grants require an evaluation as a stipulation of the grant. For small organizations that may not be able to hire an evaluation specialist, Ms. Vertz suggests looking to a local college or university where a graduate student may be interested in following a grant as part of a thesis.

— Paula Wasley

Tuesday March 31, 2009 | Permalink

Comments

1. Most grant applications have a budget line to group small items which would be impractical to list separately. To describe that as “inappropriate” is ridiculous.

   — Branden Copec    Mar 31, 05:20 PM    #

2. I agree with the presenter’s comment. All expenses should be tied to activities. Thus, any expense that is justifiable and reasonable should fit under a meaningful (descriptive) budget category. Even “Other” expenses can be itemized.

   — Leslie VanHoy    Mar 31, 06:08 PM    #

3. And how many grant makers are willing to fund an evaluation component? Very few in my experience.

   — Philanthro Joe    Mar 31, 10:57 PM    #

Commenting is closed for this article.

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