Grant Writing Tips

There are many helpful resources for finding funding, this site will list several options depending on your district’s personal needs.

• Before you begin to research grant funding, know what you want the outcome to be, what your needs are and how much funding it will take to make this project effective.
• Research is monumental in grant writing.  You must be familiar with educational programs, strategies and different modalities for both teaching and learning.
• If you are writing a literacy grant, you should research literacy in the United States, the percentage of America’s illiterate population and effective programs that have been used to raise literacy rates.
• Think about the amount you will need.  If you need less than $1,000.00, you might want to consider just asking someone for it.  It is better to start close, preferably with a local business or organization.
• Target, Wal-Mart, Wells Fargo, all offer small grant funding and the applications are short and simple.  Total funding amounts are between $500.00-$2,500.00.
• The use of Internet search engines such as Yahoo, Lycos and AltaVista can also help you locate potential grant resources.  For example, typing the word "grants" will give you a list of links that you might check.  Using "reading" or "mathematics" as a key word will also provide a list of resources, some of which will relate to grants. A favorite search engine is www.mamma.com which allows users to do a power search that includes the above mentioned engines.

Mega lists of links to Funders

Listings in the "mega-list" category are links to sites, which in turn link to many other useful grant links.  These mega-lists are an excellent place to begin a search.  Since they connect to many additional sites, you get a good return on your investment of net surfing time.

10 Essential Web Sites for Grant Seekers
These sites are portal sites that lead to scores of other related pages or search engines that provide valuable information for grant seekers.

Kathy Schrock’s Guide for Educators Home Page
This site is part of a huge site with links to many sources and kinds of information for educators.  This page links to grant resources for educators.

NASA K-12 Internet Initiative Grant Information
This mega-list of links focuses on science, math, engineering, and educational technology.

School Technology Funding Center
This site contains information on school technology Grant Opportunities.

Knowledge Network Explorer
This site (from Pacific Bell) includes reliable resources for getting information and expertise needed for an intelligent pursuit of grant funding.  In addition, this site offers information on locating grants, writing grant proposals and identifying other resources.

School Grants
This site for K-12 educators includes grant opportunities, grant writing tips, fund raising opportunities, contests, scholarships and tuition and a free electronic newsletter.