Writing funding applications can be rather tiresome.  Reading them can be worse.  A bunch of applications where the details are fairly sketchy can mean the reader has to spend many hours googling to colour in the picture. 

So, in the spirit of making my life slightly more colourful, I’ve pulled together my list of things I look at when reading grant applications.  There will be resources out there to help people pull their information together, but from what I’ve been seeing recently, they aren’t getting read!

When writing an application, a key thing is to think of the end user: why would the person reading this application think your project was worth investing real money in. 

1. Put some cash in yourself.  If you are looking for at a community project, it’s good to show some skin in the game.  This should involve either using some of your own reserves, or involve some funding from your community – good old quiz nights, auctions and the like.  It could involve a spot of labour as well: volunteer time which can be costed into your project if they are actually doing work like painting.  I like proactive communities.  It also helps get that sense of ownership within your community: which should translate to better maintenance and pride.
2. Look to leverage your community.  If you are in an area where there are not many jobs, can your building project provide training opportunities for young people in the area?  I know that Health and Safety can be a reason not to do this stuff, but perhaps you can work with someone who might try? 
   
3. For a capital project, figure out you will manage the project in an ongoing manner.  Who owns it?  Whose responsible for maintenance?  Where will you fund that from?  Or will it earn you an income?
4. Get people to endorse your project.  This can include the local MP and district council, and potential users of the facility. This shows that there is some wide spread support from the community.  However, these need to be more than simple “great idea” endorsements.  For example, if a school is a potential user of the asset, it’s helpful to understand where they see this project within their overall priorities.  People doing the endorsement should ask themselves whether this project is the most effective spend of money within their community. 
5. Offer up a quick “competitor” analysis.  Sometimes it’s hard to understand the micro role of the organisation within the context of the larger community.  For example, is it the only community space in the area?  What other clubs are around?  What do they charge?  Why is your organisation different from the others in that space?
6. How many people use your facility?  Are they regular users: is that 100 of the same people every week, or different people every week? Are you a dying club?  Be honest: will a dollop of cash just hold back the inevitable?  What’s the role of fees within your organisation?  Why can’t you put them up?  How often are you busy?  
7. Budget up the whole project, and then break it down for the specific bit you want the funder to fund.  This helps to understand who else is involved, and where the money for the project is coming from.
8. Baby steps.  Prove that you can do what you want to do by starting small.  This shows that you can deliver, and that you do have community buy in.  A funder is unlikely to hand over large wads of cash to an unknown entity.
9. Who do you collaborate with?  Reinvention of the wheel is a fairly common thing – you should try to show that you know best practice, and how you would leverage this.  Can you find a mentor in another part of the country who can help you?
10. Think of how you are governed.  Look beyond the family and friends. Find people who will disagree and challenge you – in a productive manner of course!
    

There are an awful lot of community projects and groups out there all looking for money.  If you are going to get support, then the project needs to stand out.  A good application will have more information than the funder actually asks, and should demonstrate genuine community need verses committee want. It should show where the project fits strategically within the community, and how you make the world a better place.

Would love to talk with you if you think this is just a little bit interesting.

Husband and I are off to the school ball tomorrow night.  It will be a great night out: we get to hang out with friends we have made through the school, have a bit of a boogie, tell some lies, create (and probably forget) some memories, and get some cash in for our new senior playground.  We should raise around $20,000 from our community through auctions, and give business owners within our community an opportunity to profile their wares and their skills. But more important than that: we will have forged a tighter parental village around our children. 

The reason I mention this is because Rata Foundation has just released their 2015 grants.  I am busy cutting them into my mega database, but was struck with a few thoughts on their Education grants. 

I really don’t quite understand what high decile schools are doing applying, and usually receiving, grants.  In the Rata list, we have Ohoka, Swannanoa, Sumner, St Albans Catholic, Cobham, Christchurch Boys’ and Middleton Grange all getting various amounts of money from Rata.  All decile eight and above.

Now, I know that deciles don’t actually translate to a bunch of rich parents at a local school, and that it’s a very blunt instrument with which to administer funding.  I am also aware that there are arguments that free education is something our society is based on, and that the ever insidious “parental donations” can be a source of angst amongst some.  I recall some early conversations with parents about not wanting to bake another “flipping” cake, and that they should just add to the parent donation.

However, after being involved in the PTA, and had children come through primary, I now totally get the need for community building around the school base.  There is that rather awful image of the parenting community, and I guess it can daunting for some.  The PTAs role is not to compare against the Jones’s, but rather to make sure that me, as a parent, has the social connections with my kids’ families, so we can create that village to raise children in.  And this is where the money thing comes in: tomorrow night I will reconnect with people who I don’t see at the school gate.  I will meet new people who could well be a part of my kids’ community for another decade.  I will find out other parents’ concerns, delights and challenges in the most important job we do have.  Fund raising is the nominal reason we are there, and yes we’ll be encouraged to spend too much on things we may not need.  But the real strength in these sorts of things is the community bonds which are formed and forged.

Sure it’s a truckload of work (fortunately not for me), but the team putting it together have developed skills and relationships, and will have a great knowledge now of their community.  I could have spent a couple of days producing up funding requests for the same thing, and yes, they probably would have been supported by the likes of Rata, or a gaming trust.  However, the collateral benefits from the ball would not have been realised, and our community’s lives would have been that much poorer.

I really feel that in the narrative around communities, many groups forget about the fluffy stuff.  If a community has the wherewithal to be self reliant, then I really believe it jolly well should be.  Just because the money is actually available doesn’t mean it should be tapped.

Another component to our entitled young offspring is getting them to work for it.  This could be through some form of child centred fundraising: mufti days, swim a thons or whatever.  Getting the kids to have some skin in the game on things that benefit them I reckon goes a long way to having them respect what is provided for them.

Now, Rata’s grants list don’t actually show what the money goes towards, and its often hard to understand where the grants go to from individual school communications.  There are some instances when the money is totally justified: before we ask can we please understand the want verses the need, and secondly, consider the resources of the community.

Would love to talk with you if you think this is just a little bit interesting.