Grant Writing

Catalog description

Grants can do many things. Let's say you are a student who has always dreamed of combining help for food-insecure people with support for the mentally ill homeless. You've written papers about it for classes; you've read lots of research that points to past pitfalls and future innovative possibilities--but now you want to make it real by finding funding for the program you've envisioned. Or maybe you have your sights set on finding an existing non-profit foundation that might serve as a fiscal conduit for grants that will feed the cause you feel passionately about. These scenarios and many others call for finding and winning a grant. Here's what grants can't do: Write themselves. Given that writers of grants do not have one how-to professional manual to rely on, professional grant-seekers must learn to have flexible responses to a variety of writing situations. Every grant proposal is different, as is every population with a problem to solve, and every organization hoping to help with the solution. A successful grant-writer achieves confidence with hands-on practice-confidence earned from mastering the underlying principles of effective research and outreach; feasible and complete content-generation; and the writing of precise, clear, audience-centered prose. English 478 will provide you with the basic knowledge and practice needed to get you on your way to professional confidence. Six Main Learning Goals: * Comprehensive understanding of the grant-writing field * Strategic use of research skills to match program to foundation, need to grant-maker * Beginning mastery of all elements of the basic proposal, including: mission match, objectives that fill a proven need, evaluation strategies that reliably measure outcome, a feasible budget, and proof of capacity and sustainability * Practice of skills most needed in the current economic and political climate, including collaboration, diversified funding, and innovation within an established organization * Practical use of social media and cultivation skills for sustainability of project * Mastery of applied rhetorical style emphasizing clarity and precision