Grants that are meant to produce tangible outcomes

Those who follow me, both here and on my other blog know that I am a supporter of a diversified educational strategy.  STEM is great, but someone has to build and run the machinery and use the stuff engineers dream up!

It won't do a lot of good to get more manufacturing and assembly jobs back into this country if  we don't have anyone trained to do them. Not to mention the fact that working with your hands as well as your brain is good for the economy, good for your personal financial situation, and may give workers a reason to pursue other education to progress up the career ladder.

Today's manufacturing jobs are not those of the mid-20th century, and often blend in well with more formal STEM educational goals.

Personally, I find that payng for a kid to go to college to "find themselves and their life work" is both fiscally and socially irresponsible, particularly given the dismal report of the emotional readiness of students to enter college.

If I had my way, every person would have to work for two years before they even considered college.

That's just me, but hey...I'm entitled to my opinion too.

To that end, I highlight grant opportunities that fall into that arena, and here is one that fits. To give credit where is is due, this came to my attention through Grant Gopher, and the lead paragraph reads like this:

"Nuts, Bolts & Thingamajigs awards grants annually to trade schools and community or technical colleges capable of hosting a summer camp program for girls and/or boys ages 12-16. Summer camps have been a successful way of introducing middle- and high-school students to the fascinating, high-tech career choices available to them in today's automated manufacturing industry."

The website is http://www.nutsandboltsfoundation.org.  It doesn't offer tons of money, but it could be a good fit for their target partner demographic. The closing date is November 15, 2015. You can visit their grants page at: http://www.nutsandboltsfoundation.org/camps/grants/

Is your grants dept.ready for the election?

OK.   I can hear it now.

OMG!  Enough about the cotton-picking election already!

Seriously though, if your nonprofit depends on government grants, and even if it doesn't, now might be the time to put some "what-if" scenarios in place.

In case you are new to the world of grants, an awful lot of the funding tends to follow what's hot politically and tails off when it comes to what's not.

For instance, if the Democrats retain the White House, you can expect that all of the current funding for STEM, social justice issues and the like will continue and even accelerate.

Conversely, if the Republicans win, their pet projects will receive the bulk of the funding.

If you're saying "Well, we get all of our money through private funding" you still need to look ahead.

While it's unlikely that Dems would immediately get a 90% income tax rate in place, there is little doubt that the wealthiest Americans are going to take a hit in the pocketbook.

Who funds private foundations? The wealthiest Americans.

Of course all the politicians would love to have us believe that all of the "new" revenue streams they are cultivating will be immediately returned to the people in the form of better jobs, or free college, or a host of other voter-friendly  programs.

The truth is, it just never works out that way.

For one thing, there's that little thing called the national debt, currently headed north of 18 Trillion dollars.

 

It's a funny thing, but when people (or governments) lend money they usually expect to be paid back.

Interest payments on that money are forecast to eat up ONE TRILLION dollars in just five more years.

That's up nearly 5 times from $220 Billion reported for  2012. If we do in fact add all of the free stuff envisioned by the Democrats, the debt amount could double again in just ten years.

Not paying that amount isn't an option. Given that many of the current and proposed entitlement programs are forecast to grow exponentially simply due to having more users, it stands to reason that discretionary spending will suffer at every level.

No matter which party wins out in 2016, the funding landscape is sure to change in the next decade.

The nonprofits and small businesses that weather the storm will be the ones that plan for it now.

If you are just thinking of starting a nonprofit, it might behoove you to either wait a year or so, or at least run two opposing SWOT analyses before jumping in with both feet.

If you are an existing organization, you may want to factor in significantly higher costs and lower revenue projections when evaluating old programs and before launching new ones.

Another trend may be that local governments will be looking for revenue of their own to replace any missing Federal dollars.  That could lead to the repeal of many of the traditional nonprofit perks, including tax breaks for property used for charitable purposes.

In spite of the handwriting on the wall, many nonprofits will choose to wait to plan until it is too late.

 

Don't let your organization be one of those wringing your hands and holding "going out of business" sales.   

Rating your Grantability

What do grantors look for when choosing a nonprofit to assist?

While the answer to that question can vary regarding specifics, the general profile seems to be fairly standard.

1. Compatibility with, and relevance to, the issuing grantor's mission. That means your program and organization should fit in with the goals and philosophy of the grantor. For instance, while both your organization and the grantor may support keeping youth in school, if the donor organization is supporting STEM education, they are unlikely to support a program for art education. Even the best grant application will fall flat without this component, making grantor  research one of your more important tools.

2. Geographically qualified. Most, if not all foundations, corporations and even government funding sources list the geographic areas they prefer to support. Even grantors that profess to have a national focus usually seem to support certain areas more than others.

3. Stability. Most grants require that the grantee has been in business for at least two years, have good financial records (including audited financials) and a track record of providing quality programs. Most grantors want to see at least two or even three years of long-form 990's, although your local foundations may settle for one year if you have good financial records.

4. Revenue minimums. There is no specific all-inclusive minimum amount of revenue that applies to all grantors, but all of them want the grantee to have enough income, exclusive of the grant money requested, to cover normal non-program operating expenses. That can vary from as little as $25K for a local community foundation to  as much as half a million dollars for a large national foundation. In general, the grantors want to see that the organization can survive without their contribution, since they are normally supporting your program and want to be assured that their funds will be used for that purpose.

5. Management competency. The grantor wants to be assured that the organization can manage both the program and the financial administration to achieve maximum impact from grant funding. Almost all larger grants require at least a short bio or CV for the board and key staff. The more money you want, the more this factors into the decision to fund you.

6. Positive visuals. Does your organization present well in the public eye?  That can cover anything and everything from having a quality website, to your Twitter profile, to being well-regarded in your community  press. While innovation is often prized, outlandish, immature or highly controversial conduct is not. Your reputation will become interwoven with the grantor, and they want that to be a win-win situation.

7. Strong program design. More grantors are beginning to request a program plan that functions like a business plan. They want to see clear, attainable and measurable goals and milestones they can evaluate for effectiveness.

These seven areas seem to be pretty universal throughout the philanthropic community. While each grantor may have their own subjective criteria, such as degree of sustainability, scalability, and impact, all grantors embrace the basic seven factors.

If you would like an inexpensive review of your grantability rating, drop me a line at granthelp@ida.net.