Mark Daniel Ward is a statistics professor at Purdue University.
Building on my article from April 2021 about grant writing, I asked 13 friends to offer advice about all aspects of the grant writing process. Here is their combined wisdom.
Before even getting started with writing grants, Ben Baumer, associate professor at Smith College, recommends to drawing from the expertise of your school’s grants office. He says, “They know a lot about the process and a quick conversation with them can often help you understand the details that might otherwise take hours of poring over hundreds of pages of rules and regulations.” Remember, most universities offer grant-writing workshops. These are often coordinated by the central university administration office that coordinates research activities. Most are free for faculty to attend.
Friends Offering Advice
Ben Baumer
Mine Çetinkaya-Rundel
Kumer Das
Sat Gupta
Monica Jackson
Eric Laber
Bo Li
Kelly McConville
Reneé Moore
Sastry Pantula
Olga Vitek
Lance Waller
Talitha Washington
Talitha Washington, a professor and director of the Atlanta University Center Data Science Initiative at Clark Atlanta University, mentions that some universities enable the use of consultants. “Seek grant-writing support for the proposal development,” she says. “Having weekly meetings and shared documents between the project leadership team and [consultants] helps map out key points to address, develop a timeline of items to complete, and refine and focus the project goals and objectives.”
Along the lines of institutional resources, Duke University professor Mine Çetinkaya-Rundel provides this insight: “Don’t overlook opportunities for internal grants in your institution. Not only can they be great opportunities for funding smaller and/or pilot projects, applying for them is a great way to improve your grant writing, particularly if you’re able to work with collaborators and learn from them along the way.”
Reed College associate professor Kelly McConville also urges looking broadly for potential funding opportunities. She says, “Look beyond the usual suspects (e.g., NSF, NIH) to the smaller grants or research support opportunities. In particular, cultivate relationships with the organizations for whom your work is most relevant. Once those relationships are established, ask about any potential funding support.”
Early in the process, as you are identifying funding opportunities you are interested in, Kumer Das—assistant provost and assistant vice president for research, innovation, and economic development at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette—emphasizes the need to ask yourself if you are able and ready to commit to the potential grant project. He says, “Evaluate whether this is worth your effort. A project will only be successful if you are committed to it and have enough time to complete it.”
Eric Laber, Duke University professor, has similar advice. “Don’t chase funding,” he says. “Pick projects you’d work on even if you didn’t have grant support. Funding can accelerate progress and expand the scale and scope of a project, but it rarely makes the work more interesting.” Likewise, University of North Carolina at Greensboro professor Sat Gupta says, “You need to have a great idea in mind and need to collect a strong team of collaborators.”
Reneé Moore coordinates the BST567/867 class at Drexel University with several colleagues. She describes how statisticians and biostatisticians play a vital role in grant writing, often as a part of a larger team of investigators. The planning for grant writing “should involve the statistician from the start,” she says. For this reason, their class emphasizes that there is an art and a science to effective grant writing.
Kumer also says, “Program officers want you to be successful in your submission. Talk with them as early as possible. Make sure to do your homework (e.g., reading the solicitation, searching the award database, etc.) prior to the conversation.”
Olga Vitek, a professor at Northeastern University, elaborates on this point: “Work to understand the mission of the funding agency, carefully read the RFA, and talk to program officers if possible. No matter how wonderful the proposal is, it will only be funded if it fits the agency’s goals and mission.”
Sastry Pantula is a former National Science Foundation (NSF) program officer. He says, “Program officers work hard to spread the dollars and invest in as many as they can.” Sastry also says, “Hug a program officer, they are lonely and deserve the hugs. Give them some pats on their back.”
Talitha suggests using Google to find examples of sample proposals, supporting documents, and checklists of items to include in the proposal submission. She says, “While the documents will be created by you, seeing examples provides ideas on how to structure elements of a successful proposal and will also provide clarifications on what is expected.”
Once you start writing and are ready for feedback, Sat says, “It is extremely helpful to have your proposal read by a senior pro who has had success with grants.” And Sastry says to “seek advice from others; have at least three people read the proposal before you submit; have your spouse or partner read it, too.” (This is one of my secret weapons. My wife, Laura, has a PhD in English literature and carefully reads every grant proposal I write.)
For investigators who are already experienced at grant writing, Sat reminds us that, “If you have had prior funding, you need to highlight your success story in the section on prior funding.”
My friend Bo Li, department chair and professor at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, shares insights about making grants more straightforward for reviewers. She says, “Try to describe the problem, the background, and your proposed research as clearly as possible. Please do not assume reviewers need to ‘search’ very hard in your proposal in order to find the new ideas, nor let reviewers ‘investigate’ what are the possible advantages of your proposed study compared to the previous research, because reviewers often do not have an infinite amount of time to deeply study each proposal and dig out the buried treasure.” Sastry touches on this point too: “Don’t challenge the reviewers to guess what you are thinking about.”
To ensure the relevant parts of the proposal are easy to find, Talitha and I both like to get our section headers from the solicitation itself. Talitha describes this process: “Use the request for proposal (RFP) document to guide your proposal development. The first task in proposal writing is to use the exact same language in the RFP to create an outline of headings in the proposal and the items that should be addressed as subheadings to ensure that the proposal is responsive to the call.” (Talitha and I both believe drinking more coffee leads to better grant writing, as well!)
Reneé and her collaborators say it is imperative that the “aim adequately addresses a knowledge gap within the field.” Additionally, Sastry reminds us that NSF wants to prioritize funding aimed at one or more of its 10 big ideas. He says, “It is also important to pay attention to the mission and vision of NSF and what it supports and what it doesn’t. NSF is looking for innovative and big ideas, not marginal or incremental research. It is willing to take a chance on high risk with a high pay off proposals. Also, if your research is connected to the national priorities, connects research with education, or mentors undergraduates through grad students and postdocs, enhances diversity, and has broader impacts, you will have a higher chance of getting funded.”
Many grant proposals require an assessment of the proposed activities. Even when assessment is not required, it can strengthen a proposal. Along these lines, Ben says, “Find an experienced assessment team to work with your project leadership. There are a lot of options, ranging from colleagues in academia with expertise in the learning sciences, to your own school’s institutional research group, to private companies who will do the work for hire. Whichever route you take, these people are worth their weight in gold.”
Sat and I have both had success with grants that support student research. Sat says, “The budget should be student-centered. This is obvious for student training grants but ask for student support even for other research grants.”
Reneé’s BST567/867 course also highlights the need for partners to work closely. “Collaboration among investigators (of all expertise) commences at the planning stage of the grant and continues through the publications,” she says. “Such collaboration requires sufficient effort included in the budget for all collaborators.”
Lance Waller, an Emory University professor, says, “Don’t forget your audience: Write for the reviewers. Remember, your reviewers are reading many proposals at the same time. What main things will they remember about yours?”
In my April 2021 article, I said “my best tip is to offer to serve as an NSF reviewer.” Monica Jackson, deputy provost and dean of faculty at American University, agrees with that advice. She says, “Try to serve on a grant review panel. It will help you learn how reviewers view grants.”
Regarding the feedback in the review process, Lance says, “No one likes reading critiques of their own work, but you can always improve your proposal if you read them carefully.” Monica adds, “If you are not successful the first time, then resubmit. Keep trying, but fine tuning the grant each time and making sure you are addressing all reviewer comments.”
At NSF, reviewers rate every proposal on its intellectual merit and its broader impacts. (Some grants have solicitation-specific criteria, too.) Sastry says, “Each proposal should include the intellectual merit and broader impact—clearly labeled. You can’t ignore either of them.” This is perhaps obvious to everybody who applies to NSF, but I have often seen the broader impact aspects be marginalized. Both criteria must be emphasized and justified.
Statisticians have such an important role to play, across all areas of science and beyond. We should all continue to propose innovative, collaborative research projects with exciting impacts.
Thank you Daniel for writing the essay on proposal writing. I would like to ask for any specific tips for the researchers from developing countries to win international awards. Is it possible to win an international award for addressing issues related to a specific country?
Your inputs will be highly appreciated.
Regards
Shakeel Ahmed
Assistant Professor
NUST Pakistan