How to Evaluate your Grant Proposal

Grant proposals are the stepping stone to any meaningful project that requires funding. Without a proposal, research, new businesses or nonprofits may find it difficult to get off the ground. The importance and stress of a grant proposal may lead to many sleepless nights. You can reduce your concerns by properly evaluating your proposal to ensure it effectively illustrates the merits of your project. The evaluation will give you a chance to correct any typographical, grammatical, organizational or voice errors.

Instructions

1. Read through the entire proposal and mark any typographical, grammatical or spelling errors you find. Before you can evaluate the content of your grant proposal, you need to remove all obvious errors that will distract you from a thorough edit. If necessary, employ the help of an editor to refine your vocabulary and grammar.

2. Check over your title page. This page must include the title of your project, the main participants, dates of your project, how much money you are requesting, the name of the university and department or charity affiliated with the project, if applicable, and any necessary signatures required by the grant application. Also include the contact name and address of the agency awarding the grant.

3. Read through your abstract and ensure it states the purpose of your project, the goals, designs, why you need the money, methods and significance of the project. Include who your project will target or how it will benefit the community. You will want to be as blunt and to the point as possible. Eliminate any flowery language and keep the abstract straightforward.

4. Check the introduction and project narrative to determine if you thoroughly explained how you intend to complete the project and its significance on a business, community or scientific basis, for example. The narrative needs to be the longest portion of your proposal and will include the problem, need, goals, methods, procedures, market potential, income potential, outcomes or evaluation plans in detail. Determine whether or not you need to break your narrative into more subsections than what you already have.

5. Read over the personnel section of your proposal ensuring each person listed is absolutely necessary. You need to briefly explain each person's significance to the venture, including any expertise and experience. You need to reduce personnel as necessary as the project progresses. Ideally, you need to provide a timeline within your proposal.

6. Line check each section of your budget. You must determine if each expense is necessary and ensure that all figures are accurate. Double check all calculations and ensure they add up correctly on each page listing budget-related figures. A small typographical error when dealing with budget numbers can instantly derail the financial portion of a grant proposal. Ensure any expenses that are outside the norm have explicit details as to why they are necessary.

7. Check the dates listed in the time-frame section of your proposal. Adjust this section if any delays are imminent.

Tips & Warnings

• Adjust and reevaluate your proposal as needed to comply with the requirements of each grant application you complete.

References

• National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Strokes: How to Write a Research Project Grant Application
• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: Grant Proposals