As a young child, I remember other children using the excuse, “The dog ate my homework.” During a recent session at the 2017 Grant Professionals Association (GPA) national conference, I heard horror stories of people losing entire online grants applications. Unfortunately, you can’t use the excuse, “The dog ate my online application” when submitting grants.
These days, all grant professionals deal with the frustration of submitting grants through online grants applications. Whether it is grants.gov, cybergrants.com, or a state Department of Education online grant system, you need to understand the possible glitches and tricks needed to navigate successfully. For example, many systems don’t like a simple copy and paste right click of the mouse, but insist you use Ctrl + V on the keyboard instead. On top of that, the word count in Microsoft Office or other software may not match the funder’s online system word count. Sometimes, I type directly into the online system first, immediately followed by copying and pasting the narrative into a Word document. However, that often causes more work later when editing your final draft. So, what is a frazzled grant writer to do?
Continue reading advice for online grants applications on EducationGrantsHelp.com.