Resources & Tips
Step-by-Step Guide for Grantseekers (pdf)
This document gives a brief outline of the steps involved in submitting a proposal. Once you have identified a project/idea you wish to propose, use these steps to create a program design and locate a funding source that aligns with your idea.
Contacting the Program Officer: a Winning Strategy (pdf)
Contact with the program officer from your chosen funding source is very important. By contacting her/him, you can find out whether or not your idea/project aligns with the funding source's goals and also get a competitive edge in a tight competition. This document helps you to prepare for a conversation with your program officer, provides important questions to ask him/her, and offers additional reasons why this can highten your chances of being funded.
Planning and Writing About the Need for Your Project (pdf)
Establishing the need for your project is a critical component of most grant proposals. This document provides a general overview of planning, assessing, and presenting information related to the need for the proposed project.
Developing Objectives and Activities (pdf)
Nearly all funding sources require a section in the proposal for both objectives and activities. These crucial sections can often be some of the toughest parts of the proposal writing process. This document gives helpful hints as to how to write effective objective and actitivies sections.
Developing the Program Evaluation (pdf)
Most funders require that applicants include an evaluation section in their proposal. The evaluation section shows how you will evaluate, or report on, your own program to measure its success. This document provides advice on how to fomulate a successful evaluation section.
Planning Your Proposal: Putting the Pieces Together (pdf)
Click here to find a table that shows what the overall proposal will be like and how each section will be connected to the other sections. This comprehensive analysis shows how the nature and extent, objectives, outcome evaluation, reasons and causes, activities, and process evaluation work together to champion your project/idea.
Anatomy of a Proposal (pdf)
Where to start? What to include? If the sponsoring agency does not provide specific instructions for what should be included in a proposal, the following guide may be helpful. However, when guidelines are available, read them carefully and follow them to the letter since nothing annoys a reviewer more quickly than a proposal that is poorly organized and does not include the requested information.
Tips for Applying for NIH AREA Grants via Grants.gov
The above link provides a general overview of some of the key steps and requirements for applying to the NIH AREA program via Grants.gov. The Grants.gov website is the federal web portal for grant applications; however, the website also provides useful guidance and tutorials for submitting applications. This document was created for NIH AREA grants only. Should you ever need assistance in using grants.gov for any federal application, please contact our office.
