Creating a financial aid proposal-step by step

Developing high-quality applications will take time, especially if you do not have a lot of experience. While the amount of material required may vary (generally speaking, the bigger the grant, the more complex the application process); even a 5- to 10 page proposal may take multiple days to produce. Additionally, time may be needed to gather administrative documents required for the application, like the articles of incorporation for your organization, official Profit and Loss (P/L) statements, etc.

As with exercising a muscle, practice makes proposal writing more manageable.

Depending on your available time and other resources, consider these steps for the application process:

1. Carefully read the Request for Applications (RFA): pay attention to the main themes, administrative requirements, deadlines, and more.
2. Check your eligibility: ensure your eligibility based on the RFA. If you are unsure, contact the funder or consult a legal expert for advice.
3. Assess compatibility: make sure the funder and the RFA are a good fit for your organization’s goals and strategies.
4. Develop a project outline: based on the needs identified using the Action Priority Matrix (described in Module 1: Action Priority Matrix), develop a brief project outline – you may want to leverage the SMART methodology, Theory of Change and Logic Model for this – that aligns with your strategy and with the scope of the RFA.
5. Gather administrative documents early: do not wait until the last minute to collect necessary documents. Some RFAs may require you to obtain statements from third parties, like from your bank, and you will have very little control over how much time those processes will take.
6. Involve partners: if your project includes partners, now is the time to engage them.
7. Start your budget: develop your budget concurrently with the narrative part of your application, as these elements are closely linked. (see Module 4: Budgets for further information).
8. Document application questions: record all the questions from the application form in a separate document and note character/word limits.
9. Begin drafting responses: start answering the RFA questions in your document. Initially, do not worry too much about character/word limits; you can always edit later.
10. Review and edit your responses: once finished, review all your answers. Edit for clarity and make sure you are within the text limits.
11. Seek an external review: ask someone from your organization who was not involved in the application process to review your texts. They can provide fresh perspectives and catch errors you might have missed.
12. Perform final checks and submit early: ensure your application is complete and submit before the deadline to avoid last-minute system overloads. Note that some funders, like the European Commission, accept multiple submissions up to the deadline. Submitting a nearly final version early ensures you have a submission on record, providing a safety net against unforeseen issues. Source: Poynter Institute

Some general considerations:

• Always, always be honest when answering questions. Grants are based on trust; funders talk to each other. If you are caught “cooking” your numbers or giving dishonest answers, you will very quickly find yourself cut off from all major funding opportunities and, in some cases, will have to face legal consequences.
• Do not be afraid to ask questions. Almost all funders will allow you to reach out in some form and clear up any uncertainties. Many will host online discussions before the submission deadline, during which a program officer responsible for the grant will guide you through the application process and address any questions you might have.
• If you cannot accurately answer a question, provide your best estimation and explain the reasoning behind it. If there is no opportunity to explain in the specific section (because you are only allowed to input numbers for example), find another section and consider including a short sentence about where and why you estimated. Alternatively, you can reach out to the funder and explain in a separate email.
• Be mindful of word/character/page limits and formatting requirements. Your application may be a labor of love for you, but evaluators/reviewers have the task of assessing numerous submissions. Follow the questionnaire’s character limits strictly; exceeding them, even if the system permits, is not advisable.
• Avoid overly brief responses; aim to stay within 10% of the character/word limit.
• Minimize redundancy. Some information may address multiple questions in the RFA. Try to choose strategically and only explain things once.
• Formulate your answers to address the questions specifically. Repeating the question as part of the answer may be a useful technique for this:How is your project going to impact your organization??The project is going to impact our organization in three critical ways. First …
• Make sure the text of your proposal connects to the language of the RFA and its key themes. If the aim of the RFA is about creating content for “underserved communities,” make sure to explicitly reference this in your answers.
• Focus on the clarity and legibility of your text rather than stressing over your proficiency in English or any other language that is not your first. While excessive errors can make your proposal seem less professional, remember that a grant application is not an assessment of your language skills.
• Use plain and precise language. Using plain language is beneficial, because evaluators may not be native speakers. Being precise is important because the text of your application may become the basis of the grant agreement, a legally binding contract between you and the granting authority.?
• Clear punctuation and the regular use of paragraphs are beneficial. Again, there is a person on the other end of this who has to read, understand, analyze and score applications, so you want to make their lives as comfortable as possible. It is a lot easier to read through text that is well-articulated, and conversely it is very difficult to make sense of a big wall of text and long, complicated sentences one after another.
• For the same reason, infographics and charts can help break up the sea of words and make your application stand out. They may not always be allowed or practical, but when you have to submit dozens of pages for complex, large-scale RFAs, they can convey important information and aid a fatigued reviewer’s understanding of your organization, context or project.

Don’t

“We are among the biggest newsrooms in our country.”?

“Big” can refer to a number of things. Are you talking about the number of employees? The size of your audience? The amount of content you produce? Additionally, the term “big” can vary significantly depending on the context, which the reviewer may not be familiar with. For instance, the interpretation may differ greatly between an Eastern-European country with a population of 2.5 million and India with a population of 1.4 billion.?

Do

“We have 11 full-time reporters and three editors. On average, we produce three pieces of content a day and reach an audience of around 300,000 people (Google Analytics) every month in a country of 2.5 million people. This makes us one of the most influential news organizations in our country.”

Don’t

“We adhere to the highest ethical standards of public interest journalism.”

This might depend on the situation, and if you do uphold high standards, your audience expects you to share that with them.

Do

“We are signatories of IFCN and EFCSN and comply with the standards set forth by these organizations. You can see our ‘Standards & Practices’ document here, our ‘Corrections policy’ here. These are available from our homepage along with contact information of our public editor.”

Link to the relevant sections.

Don’t

“We seek the truth and our journalism successfully serves the public interest.”

No newsroom or publisher trying to secure a grant is going to say they do not care about the truth and serve only special interests. Be specific and reference your achievements.?

Do

“During the past two years, our journalists have won multiple awards for the work, including the Very Prestigious Public Interest Journalism Award of our region. Our work exposing the disinformation spread by Greed Inc. downplaying the environmental effects of their product contributed to this important change in policy.”

Don’t

“The press and our newsroom face a very difficult environment in our country.”

Make sure you are clear about the specific challenges your organization is facing, how they are affecting your work, and maybe even how your project is linked to tackling these issues. It’s always helpful to throw in some outside references to back up your points.

Do

“The annual Digital News Report by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism describes our country as ‘a very difficult environment with high levels of intimidation of journalists.’ Our country is number # in the Reporters Without Borders annual Press Freedom Ranking and is described as ‘Partially free’ by Freedom House. Because of the widespread intimidation, recruitment for our newsroom is very difficult, but our proposed internship program may be a way to address that.”

Be realistic and present the risks and challenges, along with the potential benefits of your project. Funders will be more likely to trust their money to someone capable of providing realistic analysis than an applicant high on their own ideas.

A few things to keep in mind:

• Regardless of specific requirements in this regard, you DO want to understand how your project impacts your organization/community/environment because it will enable you to be more effective in what you do.
• Funders really want to see their resources making a difference. The better you are at documenting (monitoring, measuring) impact, the more likely you are to receive funding in the future.
• Good projects will have some MEL or M&E elements as part of the proposal, even if they are not explicitly required.
• While it is not always possible to measure everything perfectly or describe every impact mechanism, it is important to try to measure and describe what you can.
• Questions around impact and evaluation should give you space to explain why you believe your proposed project will deliver the impact you (and hopefully the funder) seek. The Theory of Change and the Logic Model will already help you do this and you may want to reference other, similar projects/interventions.