A lot of content, so we want to get started right away. Good afternoon. I'm Laura woods bash on with the US Office of Research and Cutler Institute. Welcome to our first event of our 2021 Research and Scholarship Symposium. Today's event is grant writing. Just do it. Presented by Dr. Terry sure. Hada. And this event is brought to us by the Office of Research, us some libraries and the Center for collaboration and development. Today's event is part of a newly re-imagined online research symposium series intended to bring together faculty, staff and students to celebrate all the wonderful research, scholarship and creative activity happening across US m. This virtual series will take place every Friday from noon to one, starting today until April. Early April. The series will be a mix of skill-based workshops, lightning, talk, many presentations covering a wide range of topics, research field in experiences. And a keynote address from Dr. Iccha Langford of New York University on best practices for diversity, equity and inclusion and research. Registration emails will be going out weekly and we hope you join us. I would like to thank the US some office of research. You are some libraries in the Center for collaboration and development. Dr. Shewhart up in our planning committee for making today's event possible. I would also like to thank all of you for joining us. I everyone. Happy Friday to you all. I am Caitlin Madden, graduate assistant with the US them Office of Research and Kotler Institute. And today I have the pleasure and privilege of being your moderator and zoom MC. So a few quick technical notes before we get started. We will be recording this workshop event for the US Office of Research archive and to be made available for anyone in the US and Community who was unable to attend today. If you do not wish to have your video included, please be sure. Turn that off now by clicking stop video at the bottom of your zoom window. Also, we are going to be providing closed captioning today. If you wish to utilize this, just go ahead and click the link for closed captioning that's in the chat to turn those on. For the duration of this event, all participants will be muted. We're going to open up the chat momentarily. And if you have any questions while the presentation is happening, you can submit them into the chat and the bottom of the tool bar. B will answer your questions once we reached the Q and a portion of today's event. Today we have with us Tracey meager Of the Office of Research and color Institute, and she will be helping me out behind the scenes. So if you have any technical questions, please go ahead and send those directly to us, either of us in the chat, and we'll be happy to help you. So now it is my great pleasure to introduce and welcome our workshop presenter for today's event. Today we have with us Dr. Terry Chicago is the Senior Policy Associate for research and economic development and the coordinator of the main economic improvement fund. So without further ado, here is Dr. Shamata to talk to us about grant writing, and we hope you enjoy vega. Thank you Kaelyn, and thank you for the introduction, but I prefer folks economy terry Instead of Docker. So I appreciate the edge or anybody has any questions I just asked me. I know many of you on the chat us who's run a screen. So what I'm trying to do today is coming to be a perspective of how to become more competitive grant writing. I'm not going to be talking about identifying opportunities. I think there are other, there are other parts of the symposium that you can, that you can access. But out what I want to make sure is that once you identify an opportunity, how can you develop a competitive proposal? And my presentation is, it's kind of interesting, is cartooning sort of speak. But it's really based on organizing what you're trying to do. That's based on the kind of the pitfalls that, that that that we've many folks have identified that make proposals uncompetitive. So if I can do so, let me share the screen. I hope this works. All right. Can everybody see this? Yes, TO maintain? All right, good. So so what I'm gonna do is kinda give you a quick overview. How did the successful grant that avoids common proposal pitfalls? Uhhh. One of the first things that that that that how I always get from folks or give up your proposals is they get confused in terms of the various sections of our proposal that sees more linear. And some folks are linear and thought they developed their goals, outcomes, background, justification, so on and so forth. That's on the right side. And then on and on and on the left side is a more iterative process, which is more common to everybody else. But point is this don't get hung up in terms of writing different sections in a linear fashion. If you're a linear, go right ahead. If you're iterative, you're going to start with the implementation, maybe dissemination plan. That's what. Funders looking up for maybe the goals, maybe the background, maybe you justification, go back and forth. That makes you feel comfortable. That's how I, hey, I devote my proposal. I don't wanna get stuck in a particular section because I need to think about that particular section. I may sleep on it. An accurate idea going to come back the other day and work on it. But I know for a peace of mind, it might be better for it or model that works for you. Because you can go back and forth. Because we can guarantee you By the time what you thought of in terms of what you want to do at the beginning of her proposal will be drastically different at the end of a writing before you submit the proposal because you're constantly thinking of it. So that's where I was trying to show from this slide. There is a difference between an iterative model. Here, a model. There's no right answer. Which one did you take? It's based on how you think. Alright, so, so do consider those two different approaches as you write your proposal. Alright, so anybody who has not or is in the early stages of writing a proposal, you need to understand the current environment in a grant writing world. Whether it's for profit, I'm sorry, whether it's federal, state, or a non-profit philanthropic environment. The competition is very significant. It may range from five to 35%. For the first proposal that you submit, it obviously might be 0%. So more than half of those are rejected are because the applicant has not followed the directions and they did not match the requirements of the thunder. So the message here is that you really need to make sure that your concept fits the requirements of the funder. If it does, the next thing that you need to do is to make sure that your father requirements of the funders outline. It turns a high. Submit the proposal. Here's what's going on here, or there you go. Okay. So let me back up for a second. Oops. Okay, sorry about that. I think there's another slide. It shows that success rates increase even if you fail, but you resubmit your proposal, it's going to increase because you have a a a relationship with a Program Officer that I'll explain later. But even though these are low rates and initial initial application submission, they increase once you resubmit point being necess, once you fall off a horse, get on our course and go forward. Don't be frustrated. Just go forward and address the requirements LB reviews, and I'll explain that hopefully. So these are kinds of the comments that comfort reviewers and a pretty harsh. So everybody needs to understand once they submit a proposal, as if it fails to be fun, that you're going to get really good comments from reviewers. Some of them are good comments, some of them are decent. Sunburn aren't really harsh. You have to have a heart skin because those comments are going to help you out significantly. Once you resubmit and revise your proposal, make sure that you take those comments at heart and incorporate those comments in your revision to your proposal once you resubmit. So I'm not going to read these bullets. You can read them. But, you know, that can be very harsh. And I've known her love of faculty members that once I get those kinds of comments and say I'm not going to send them because I don't like this comments in there. They're pretty harsh. If you're really aren't interested in getting into the grant writing, fielding, getting those kinds of findings, you really have to grow a thick skin because that's, that's going to work for you. So when you write, so that, that said, when you write a proposal, you need to consider good reviewer. And and and those CMS it in different form. Many of the federal and state have applications have that review panels. And those who review panels review the proposals. And then they'd make a recommendation to their program coordinator at at at who heads a panel at the federal state organizations. And does all those individuals make your decision? A Federal level, there are some agencies, like the Department of Defense, better review panels to make the final decisions at NSF. Review panels, make their recommendations are broken. Program officer and he or she makes the final decision. That that varies within the different federal stick organizations. In a private foundations. The staff usually screens of proposals that make a recommendation to program director. And that's really key. And you need to understand that even if your proposal is competitive, all reviewers were trying, will try to identify the weakest point in your proposal. Once they make the reviews. That's calm. Alright, so the market pet of your proposal is the more criticism you may get back. Yes. But don't worry about that. It really is based on the reviews that come from those individuals on a review panel that have an axe to grind and it might not be against you, but it's just the way they think. So that's a negative, but don't worry it by dy as it goes through this process. So when you think about grant writing, your success is really based on your ideas that eliminates any of the tuples. So there are really many examples that show that your idea made it maybe the best slice of bread in the world. But because the way you wrote to proposal really undermines what you're trying to get across. So let me share some of those pitfalls for you. But before I get that, when you identify something that you want to write about, and I think many of you on this call have a depreciation of that. One thing that I want to emphasize to everybody here is not to chase the money. There are many opportunities for, for federal, state and foundation grants that fit any opportunity to anyone they think of. But would you, What you do not want to do is to modify what you're trying to accomplish to fit the needs of a funder. That's what I'm trying to get at in terms of not chasing the Thunder. You need to know what you're passionate about. What is the problem you're trying to solve and why that's important? And how what you're trying to accomplish adds value to existing knowledge and adds more knowledge. So why is their idea better? How is it unique and different? And, and what will it contribute? And who will benefit from that? Once you really have a good idea and what, and how to answer this question in terms of starting point. Then when you go through the process of working with a research service center and Laura, trace it and whoever it Caitlin and identify funding opportunity. You need to match that passion with a funding opportunity. What you need to be careful of is not to sacrifice what your passion is with the funding. Don't chase the money. Don't taste them. Because at some point in time we need to make a decision whether or not this is really important for, for where you're trying to accomplish. Okay? So that being said, a pitfall number one, is a poor fit based on what I just said, make sure that what you're trying to accomplish fits with the needs of the funder. One way to do that is, you know, a paragraph is summarize where you're trying to accomplish with the outcomes are make sure that you read the program announcement because that program officers are going to ask you that question. So make sure your your your question to the program officer understands what the requirement of the announcement is. So note so write a paragraph or question. This is what I'm trying to do. This I want to try to accomplish this is how I will do it in a paragraph or to send that email to your program officer and then follow up that any now. So I'm going to call you in the next week or so to have that discussion. Do not cold call that problem. Often. Send that email to them. And that they will respond to you if they do not follow up. That's a second email to, you know, in the past week, I select to schedule call. Invariably they'll do that. Repurpose of their job is to help you be more competitive. So so your Program Officer really is really important in making sure that you make sure that you get the opportunity to get funding for bed in New Jersey. And once you get those funds that you continuously additional support from one project to the next. So that program officer is really, really important. That person is really your best friend in making sure that you engage with that with our funding agency. So make sure that there's a great fit between what you're trying to accomplish and with the program announcement. And the best way to do that is making contact with the problem buffs. Next pitfall is really having a poor organization in developing or proposal. And, you know, I've outlined a few outlines. There are typical proposals. Those varies vary based on the requirements of the thunder. So this is not, you know, what everybody does is it really varies from one to the other, but this is kind of the common ways that funders look at whether it's a research education proposal or another kind of proposal. But the point being is this, you need to structure your proposal based on a requirement of the funder. Do not deviate to not get smart and identifying new section in your proposal that's outside of what the funder is looking for. So be very specific and follow the rules of the funder. And then the fingers will say, at the bottom of the slide, we need supporting documentation. Or they may say, we do not need supporting documentation. If they need supporting documentation though, they will outline what they really need to not go off script with that. If they do not need supporting documentation, do not give them supporting documentation are. So I mean, that's straightforward. Don't give him any more information that are requesting and don't voluntary anything us. The third pitfall is a weak argument. And this is very important. So when you outline your project, you need to make some justification. In lighter, your project is really important. Do not express your opinion. Opinions do not matter. What you need to make sure that when you outline wire, project has importance. It's really based on offer, authoritative result sources. What are the documentation's one, there are references. So I've seen a lot of proposals because I've been a reviewer that folks have really express their opinion. And that's I really No, no. I don't care about your opinion. What I want to make sure is that where you're trying to emphasize in terms of your project is really based on competition from research projects or peer-reviewed references from other individuals. That's really important. Hurry. So opinions do not matter. In fact, that's a no, no. If you don't have any references work of why you're just defining points of your project. Your project is not, is not going to go forward. The other is high you the next clip 4s gyrating jargon. That's that's really important. And I think that a few of us on the call, including me, we grew reviews are a lot of proposals. What you have to understand when you submit a proposal to an agency, particularly federal and state agencies. More so for Federal a few members of most other members of the review panel I generalists. There might be one or two folks at first specific areas that you're proposing. So for the other members, you want to make it more general in terms of your description of your project. And in doing so, you want to avoid any jargon say to you do not understand abbreviations that are not qualified. Languages are enough familiar with statements that are not familiar with it, as well as acronyms. So you really have to make sure that you avoid any jargons. Because most of the folks on a review panel I generalists and you do not understand that particular field that you're in. So you have to use acronyms, make sure you qualify those acronyms, but do not use any jargons that to common individual really doesn't understand. And that's going to be critical, especially as federal funds for finding eggs. Another thing that is really annoying too many reviewers is a use of passive versus active voice. Please, please do not use passive voice. Use active voice. And this slide gives you a few examples how to do that. Not only does it alleviate the pain under reviewers and they're reading, but I can guarantee you when you use active voice versus passive voice, you're going to save a lot of space in your writing. This very critical, what do you have to meet a patient limitation? So so what I'm trying to say is that not all just active voice is better, but it's also better when you're trying to save space in your proposal. And that really works, believe me. So use active voice all the time as opposed to passive voice. What are they really next pitfall whenever they're really critical features of, of, of any proposal he's up in your introduction, which really states what the state-of-the-art as what did deficiencies of the pay gap is all about. And based on that gap, what are the issues you're going to address? And based on that, how are you going to address them that gave to your goals and objectives for a project? Many folks, once they get to that point in that section of the proposal, they, their they have a very difficult way of identifying what their very specific objectives and how they're going to measure those based on kind of the tail end of their introduction. So that becomes really very important. If you're going to say, you're going to address in a generic way. This is what I'm going to redress based on deficiency. Your goals and objectives half-full align with that. And many folks have a problem with making sure the alignment exists. So that alignment of goals and objectives has to be very specific and very measurable. If you can't do that, you're going to have a problem with the reviewers because they can't make a connection. They're going to say, you said this in the intro. These aren't deficiencies. This is where I'm gonna dress. But when it comes to the goals and objectives that are really into the work plan, they're going to have a heart problem making that kind of connection. So it's really verse seven. So the next slide here is what, what we term as a use of a logic model. And this is what we use a lot and you're couplers to, because what it does is it aligns with what you're trying to dress in terms that community needs, what the strategies are, inputs, the activities outputs, short-term outcomes, midterm, and long-term outcomes. Once you go through this exercise. And it's really, it may be difficult because you may not have addressed that in the past. If you have a problem with this model, call me or Maggie, to colored suit will help you up. But this is, this logic models really critical because it's going to help you align with the, with a problem or that community needs and how to address those needs. That then you can make sure that your outcomes are aligned with those needs. And that will significantly help you in developing the work plan, things to develop for the proposal. Alright? And that this is an extension of what I talk about pitfall number six. If you do not have a real clear research find, really become they say what you need to do is based on a logic model, is to specify your specific tasks and timelines. Please use flowcharts, counters are a grand charts, Gantt charts, and as well as visualize. Project kind of single-page. Don't take several pages, minimize the number of pages you're going either because you have limited number of pages that you're allowed. The other pitfall is, I think I mentioned before is that you really need to follow the guidelines in the statement in the program and ask them to the letter. Do not deviate to not get smart. They're going to say, OK, you're limited to 15 pages for the application. If he goes 14 or 13, sorry, 50 pages, if you go 16 pages, we're not going to accept that. They may say we'll accept the 15 pages, but we're going to discard this 16 page. It really depends on the agency. You may go 14 pages was find say a maximum of 15. Do not go over that. They're going to specify the font margin and spacing. You need to fall that any other certification that's required for the application, that's where you work with us on research service safer and it'll help you forgot what those certifications are. Budget inheritor, many of those are missing needed to make sure if they're required to include those. Research service sector will help you to. I know a lot of documents do not include those. I can guarantee you. The colored stood Research Service Center will make sure that you do not include any documents are not required. When you write the application and you write a narrative. Please make sure that you read the program announcement. Please make sure when you do that. You read this section in your program and outspoken outlines or review criteria. That review criteria, it is really important. Hope you understand or viewers how they're going to review your proposal. Make sure that when you develop your narrative, that you address those review criteria in your narrative. If you have a highlight those in your narrative, Go ahead. Some federal agencies may require your structure of your application. Follow the book writer, which is even better. But if they don't, make sure you understand the criteria and make sure that when you write your narrative, your project narrative, that your response adheres and response to the criteria. Because their reviewers are going to look at that. You can develop different sections in your criteria, in your narrative that does that. Or you can bold online, highlight whatever you want. Just make sure that yours, your narrative response to the review car carry. The other thing is a weak abstract, please everybody understand that? Review. Well, we covered 19, but especially Coburn 19, which really hasn't changed that much over while this virtual. Each reviewers given about 15 proposals and maybe 12 proposes to review. And it takes about two to three days to do that. By the time everybody gets together, they're really tired, especially on the second or third. Third again and went to end the virtual meeting or they want to leave the hotel's wherever. So if your proposals not any upper stack of applications that are reunion first day and it ends up at the third stack, the end of the stack. Reviewers are really tired and they want to make sure that you're giving every proposed to the opportunity to be reviewed appropriately. One thing that was really critical to them is the abstract, one-page abstract. And I always emphasize, emphasize that when you write the abstract, which is, which must be the last thing you complete in your proposal. That abstract has to demonstrate what I call the wow factor. When they're talking about thick about this. When you're tired, if someone gives you one pager to read, What do you think of that guy? You need to look at the scan this very quickly and say, whoa, it I've read this in less than 30 seconds. I don't like it, or wow. This is really importance. Let's look at this proposal. This is what I'm talking about, your abstract because the most essential part of your application that must be done at the last thing, once you've completed all your components of your application. Because abstracts reflect what you're going to do in the beginning and the end of a project. But when you really think about it of your project, and it will completely change by the time you complete your proposal. Because things change, a concept changes. But your abstract has to demonstrate to the reviewer, This is really important for you to consider. So the wow factor is will the importance once you're preparing your abstract? This is really a central, I've been a reviewer. I get really tired whenever review proposals 15. At the end of the third day or second day, I want to end things up. But when I read the first page of an abstract compared to others, as something catches my eye, I'm willing to look at DEC, and inevitably, that becomes really important to whether proposal is considered for funding in the current round or an exon. Yeah, in a pre submission and review. This is really important. You cannot edit your proposal. What's your gut or do you think are good? You really need to get your colleagues involved. Especially folks out perhaps weren't involved in other applications that are funding the same agency. Let them review it, let them do the edits. They're qualified to give you critique. I'm going to contact a proposal because the worst thing that you want to do is to put your ego in the way. If you really want to get funded, check your ego at the door and let somebody else could be a critical review. Right. And and allow time for your rights because you're going to do that and relate to rewrite. My habit is this, once I've started a narrative, every time I I write a narrative and make some edits or was save that document and a different name. I don't lose that earlier document because I know much of my thought in the early documents, I might need it in a fifth or fourth order. The 16th iteration of my narrative. Don't lose that thought that you may think you don't need it in the second edition. Thank you may need it in a tenth edition, but you want to find out what you said in the beginning. So just make sure that you save your additions, revisions in sequence so you can get back to them. But you need to proofread everything you do and you can't do that alone. So could be a colleague or someone in your office, someone at your diversity that really can help you edit and proofread it documented. The worst thing that we hate as a reviewer is that there are a lot of myths, spying and grammatical errors, especially in the abstract. Already introduction. If there are lot of spelling errors and grammatical errors, mistakes, it really sets the stage that we think that this, this proposal really, even it might be great. It's just not good because misspelling common words, you have lot of errors. So why are we going to waste our time? So that really becomes an issue with reviewers. So just make sure that you go through the process with your colleagues or anybody else to review your documents for consistency. Fourth, factual contents for errors, grammatical spelling. That's really important. And I think that's the last slide, is I really encourage everybody when you go through your application, once you figured done, just do edited, more editing, rewrite and additional rewrite, savior prior prior documents. Because you're gonna go back to that. I remember that for few applications I wrote, I had 50 different versions from the beginning to the end of an application. Because I don't wanna lose my thoughts from a, from something I've thought about two weeks ago that didn't. I realize now I discarded, but now I realize it's really important. I need to capture that font, put it into the final narrative. So that's really important. The critical thing is this. We all have our egos. We all have our pride of authorship on when it comes to application. And you're trying to get funded, which is in a competitive world, you got to discard that. Gotta rely on your colleagues and anybody else that can help you review edits, gives you a reality check on application before you submit. And the last thing I would say is that whatever you do, you gotta be consistent with the requirements of the funder. You can, you know, we can help you in identifying funding opportunities. But if you can't follow the requirements of the Funded, you're, you're doomed to fail. So don't following those. Don't, don't be cute. Don't come up with great ideas. Funders don't like that. Say, this is what I need, X, Y, and Z. Given X, Y, and Z, don't give him anything else. Then they come back and ask you for x2, y, x, that's fine. But any application based on what they are requiring, don't give them anything else. More than what they are requiring are are asking for it. So kn I'm Laura, I guess I'm done. I'm over the questions. Ready but hazarding. Awesome. Thank you, Terry. That was wonderful. We'll spend the next ten or 15 minutes answering any questions that you all have. So if you have any questions, just go ahead and submit them into the chat box. And we will answer them in the order in which they are received. If we run out of time and don't get to your question, we will follow up with an answer in an email. So that being said, Terry, the first question we have is, how broad slash specific should this short pitched me? The short pitch in terms of it is that I'm not sure what that means. Shrink that was from like an Early on a slide early on. When you're like, well, okay, so I interpret that is, well, a short pitch is really from my perspective friend who said the question is really the abstract. That's where the short pitches, because that's like from the abstract proposals like the elevator speech. Hi, I'm Terry. Obviously great clarification on that question. And it depends to the grand operas, they're not gonna make it brought because specific. And also this question. They also added the contract the contract to the program officer to see if it's a good bet. Yeah. So so yeah, I think I understand hole by the Senate in a funding announcement, Dolby contexts for protocol officer, that's where you get to that information. When you reach out to a Program Officer. Before you do that, make sure you understand. You read the program announcement, your questions or program officer that's related to what you're trying to do has to be tied with the program and ask them for quite. That means your response has to be, a candidate, cannot be broad, but it has to be tied in to the requirements. Because if it's not a Program Officer before he or she wants to talk to you will say, I read what you set me. Have you read the program announcement? That's a signal that you have not because based on what you're proposing. So read the program announcement and a response to the program has your project has to be verse specifically, not General, their response to that announcement. And then you'll have better opportunities to have a conversation with the program ofs o to answer the question. Okay, thanks. K. The next question is, what are some common supporting documents? Oh, well, supporting Dot-com. Okay. Resumes which are required or not supporting documents by letters of commitment as opposed to letters of support. Letters a few years ago. Agency would approve would accept letter support, which is a letter from the university president and saying, hey, this project really fits with what we're doing, blah, blah, blah. It expands what we're trying to achieve. Letters of commitment and that's, and even letters from our congressional delegation. More so they're less importance. Because what aren't into Apache members is supposed to say, this is great for me. Hace, please support it. What do you do now looking for more our letter support commitments. If you identify partners, can your application those partners need to submit include a letter of commitment in the application with yours that say, this is my commitments, x windy and personal time or funding accessible advocate resources that are very important to achieving the goals and objectives of the project. Those are a lot of commitments that are very important to the project as opposed to a letter of support. So they're very different. Definitions do not follow voters support. William course. Most narrow looking for letters of commandments as I explain. Ok, great. Then the next question we have is, Can you speak a little bit about logic models slash specific objectives for more basic scientific research rather than applied work. Like when you are not aiming to solve a community problem, raised floors, etc. But I think that's a good question and I'm not sure I can answer that in a timeframe. I think. We are Kotler can help that in a separate conversation. But I would not I would ask the folks on this call is not to be concerned about logic models in terms of the distinction between research and say, educational objectives, logic models apply to different kinds of activities. The purpose of a logic model is to help you define what the goals and objectives and strategies and outcomes you're trying to achieve. And that could be stated in different ways that, that, that are consistent with research proposals or educational proposals are out which proposals community needs. From the Rishi research perspective could be aligned with which went to state of the art is about in terms of the, the the literature, you know, covered 19 for example. We don't know how they react to vaccines. I'm just thinking out loud here. That's a convenient need. Alright. So you can couched community didn't that context so soon to dissuade anybody from using a logic model. But what it does is it helps you really align with what you're trying to achieve was a real problem and how you can address that cannot proposal that will achieve the outcome, the goals and objectives that the community is trying to address. So if anybody from that research, research, but traditionally, we should research scripts, the perspective that when I have a better understanding of a logic model, give me a call or maggie or anybody else at the research center and it will help you up where I do know is that the educational community and particularly to ponder education. And now also the Department of Labor at the federal level. As all other state are looking more too. Reviewing proposals that have logic, model components, kingdom, research proposals are not that very specific. But I think from your thought perspective is fully important, so reach out to us, it will help you out. Okay? The next question is, your example uses a very specific number, 90%. Do you usually err on the side of a cautious number to better the likelihood you can achieve it. 90% for success, right? Doesn't successor. Well, it was the example that Hughes, I think it was like slide ten, Marine and downstream from the it was from the slide about formulating specific goals and objectives. And I believe it said 90% success rate. I said no. I think it was, it was an example, two examples. Yet. So to me that it's almost palm is saying y'all are fun. Your potential funders that your project will deliver 90% pass rate, right? Right. Isaac Murray, I think what I was trying to get was a slide where we're talking about Objective-C too, needs to be measurable. All right, so the one on the right, left doesn't have a number or a percentage or something. What are you, what are you trying to achieve at the end or a project? Alright, so that box on the poor. They said, we anticipate that completion of the new curriculum resulted in has two scores. What the funders are looking for, work giving you x million dollars. Don't give us some generic explanation of what the outcomes will be or the objective, we give us something specific. So the example I'm going to write for better is at least 90% of the course credits will pass International richard examination. I'm not suggesting 90%. This is, this, this came, came out from some of the comments in the past. So the point being is when you, it's very important that we identify objectives. They have to be measurable. Does M accessing it, guys? Thanks. I'm just wondering though, if an ambitious number is considered a promise and then now we implement the project and cannot and do not get those numbers. I think I think Maria, what do you need to do with whatever numbers or percentage of use? I would suggest that your underestimate that. Okay. And then if you can't see those non-visible beyond next, great. Just make sure that you explain in your, in your proposal how you justify that number. Alright, and and feel it, and it's absolutely correct to say and appropriate to say my numbers 15%. I know I can achieve that more than that, but I'm more comfortable 50%. If I could achieve higher than that, I'll go for it. Okay? So it's whatever number that you can justify in the application. Don't, don't overstate that because reviewers are going to say, Marie, you really are over the, over the, you know, you're really you don't have any justification for the number you're talking about, justify why you're doing it. Yeah. Okay, great. Thanks, Teri. The next question we have is, how important is it to create a compelling story? An example of a person impacted by the problem you are speaking to a drops Kaelyn today. I'd like, may be essential question of how important is it to create a compelling story? It's absolutely essential in any proposal. What's the justification for what you're trying to do with the background. Most existing work that's been done. What's the data gapp, Knowledge Gap. Why are you doing this proposal or this project? Alright? If you're trying to fun, propose a project at that leverage, what somebody else did. For the purpose of all we're trying to do here in Maine, it's not going to work. And I'm glad you asked that question. Your project has to be innovative. You may have Via project in say, Utah, they did the same thing. Do not think that you can propose transferring what you taught it in May and you'll want to replicate that. That's not that's not what funding case or working for. What you're trying to find out is, what's the added value? So if you take something else from another state that you can justify, that we can tweak and make changes given the unique culture or environment that you are pectin University are made. That's a different kind of lens that we can look at. That's what the age is suitable to. Yeah. So it has to be difference cannot be the same ol same thing because your project will not be funded. So I hope that helps. Does I ask the question can think though. Okay. So the next question as kind of a bunch of questions rolled into one. Yeah. So it says, how do you approach funders? If you are planning to approach several groups, are agencies. Who do you contact? First? Do you approach it differently than if trying to get funding from a single funder? You Taliban, you plan and portfolio of funding. Now, I understand that question. I really understand. Cross out the neighborhood for i it's one of those things that you don't want to show your strategies to funders? I think what is for my if I understand that question correctly, if you're in the beginning stages of identifying, you may have a project that could be funded by what? A by one agency. That's easy. Talk to program officers. Thick way you can do and go forward with that. You may have a projects. It has different features associated with it. That requires different funding agencies are different. A different strategy requires a different approach to writing different grants. Would I would suggest if that's the case, if that's what you think about is is have a conversation with a different project officers without necessarily letting them know, hey, I'm going to NSF, Hey, I'm going to find out the popular education. Hey, I'm going to make Community Foundation. Give them the overall perspective of what you're trying to accomplish in that one page, summary. And shopping around. Alright, so you're not shopping around for, you're not chasing the funds. You're shopping around for funders. That's a little bit different perspective. So outline what you need to do it and share it with different agencies that you know could contribute to funding your project. At some point in time, you'll figure out that those three or four different or five different contexts you made, you can submit your proposal to those three funders. We'll fund in different slices that require maybe different proposals. By different slices, there will fund your project is a little bit complicated. And I had a mixture of early expanded correctly. That's a proper strands follow. And if you have any questions, give us a call to Russia's target sector and will help you figures when I'm okay with that to more questions. Laughs. I think if we move quickly, we can get through them. There. The next question is there are very specific formats for things like PI bio. Is there a best place to go to get these documents that will be needed for every grant. Now? Well, yes. We do have I don't think some website or sick or retrace it, but I do have access to bio formats for NSF or NIH for nasa. I could provide those or maybe your Laura, we could put that on our website for rotary pump for the template. But you can't use the same bio format for NSF, for nasa. Or and I sat there. Unfortunately, they have their own requirements. So we can provide those templates and instructions to help you out. Okay, and then the last question we had is, if I'm including an authoritative resource and data, must I cite my resource and then include a reference page at the end of the grant, if applicable? Yes. If you have if you're if you're including a resource pain your narrative, then you need to have site that narrative. That resource and reference page is to put the reference in that page. That reference in the reference page. So every alpha, every application in a narrative at the end has your beer budget, your resume. While every narrative at the end of in there before and that resume, that budget has a bibliography or reference page. And that page is a list of references that you cite. Your nerve and as loss Roger, document. So that's where you put the references. Okay, great. Alright, that's it for questions. If you all have any more questions that you think about or we didn't answer your question as well as you had hoped, just go ahead and reach out to us at the US Office of Research will be happy to help you. Right now. I will just say a big thank you to Terry for the presentation and thank you to everyone for joining us and your questions. I'm going to pass it over to Laura really quickly to close this out. Laura, you're muted. Sorry about that, guys. So just before we finish up today, I just wanted to invite you all to participate in a quick two minute anonymous survey about today's event by clicking on the link in the chat. Again, I want to thank you for attending and thank you to our presenter, Terry Shamata. As I mentioned at the beginning of the session. And we'll be sending out more registration email's for all the upcoming events of this virtual series. So please keep an eye out for those. And thank you for coming today. How did it go? Everybody to the waiting room. I guess we should stop recording.