Well, hello, and welcome to Grant Writing Today.
I'm your host, Rodney Walker, and I'm
happy that you are listening in
today. You're tuned into the show dedicated 100% to shining
a light on what's happening in the world of grant
writing today so that you can stay informed, so that
you can know latest trends, so that you can be
informed about some of the cool things that are happening
across the landscape in the area of grant writing.
And today, I'm excited to tell you
about some cool things that are happening.
In fact, there's a school and a really cool teacher by
the name of Kelly McLean who's doing some cool things.
She's an English teacher. And guess what
she has? Some students that she's teaching, some real
life experiences in learning how to do grant writing.
Have you ever been one of those
students before you've been in class?
You're like, man, what in the world does
this have to do with anything I'm going
to be doing in the real world?
Well, for four years now, Kelly McLean
has been teaching and having her students
to actually prepare a proposal.
They go and they do research.
And as they do research, the next thing
is that they then take that research and
begin to develop an argument, put together a
proposal, and that's a real life exercise.
Now the classes are and the students are
actually kind of competing, and the students themselves
will review and determine which other projects or
the proposals were the best.
The best one, from my understanding, is going
to be awarded $250, and that award is
going to go, I believe, to that organization.
So it's really cool what they're doing
and the students are leading the way.
And Congratulations on such a cool project.
Way to go, Ms. Mclean.
Keep up the good work.
I'm cheering for you guys.
In fact, before the end of the show, I'm going
to share with you one thing that I'm going to
do in addition to what you guys are doing, because
I think what you're doing is so cool, and I
want the world to know about what you're doing.
Now let's go and look at some other
things that are happening in the grant world.
We just recently had a really cool opportunity
to have an opportunity yesterday to hang out
with a lot of cool people.
And it was so fun because these were
other grant professionals who were wanting to scale
their business up to six figures.
And sometimes when you're very new and you're just kind
of starting out, that may seem like a lot of
money to you, but I want to let you know.
And especially those students over at West High, I
want you to know that that skill that your
teacher is telling you about, there's actually a group
who recently just got awarded an opportunity to do
grant writing as contracted work.
And in the Patterson time, this group that just
got awarded, they received a $288,000 grant writing contract.
And this firm is now going to be doing some work.
Now, this firm now, listen students.
What your teacher is just giving you in terms of
learning the skill, you're seeing somebody right now that with
their firm, they've been able to earn over a quarter
of a million dollars with this one contract.
Now, here's the cool thing.
This organization has been doing some of
the grant writing, and they've already helped
the city to secure about $14.3 million.
And as the article points out,
they were paid about $84,000.
And so according to the person who's the President,
this person informs us says, hey, listen, we got a
return on your investment of $170 to $1.
So for every $1
we've earned, basically $170 for you. Not bad.
I like the way when you look at
what we do as grant professionals, we bring
value by helping to bring additional resources.
But I want you students, and not just you
students, those of you who are looking to do
your grant writing business and to grow it, to
see also what's possible and not to limit yourself,
because the more value you bring, the more you
are able to receive in terms of compensation.
So I want to encourage you even in this whole
space, not to be under pricing yourself, because grant professionals
bring a lot of value to the world.
Now, I'm looking just in case you don't know, I simply
have gone to Google and typed in Grant Writing Today.
And if you go right underneath the main search,
you'll see that there are some links that says
all video, books, images, and then news.
And so I'm simply going and highlighting some of
the cool things that are happening in the news.
So if you want to see and read more
in depth about some of these stories I'm telling
you about, look right underneath the show notes.
I'm going to leave a link
to each of these different stories.
But if you want to look at some of the other
things that I may not be mentioning today, just simply go
over and type in grant writing and then go to the
new section in Google and you'll get a chance to see
some of these other cool stories of what's happening.
Now let's take a look at a couple of
other things, and I want to share with you.
There was a grant $82,000 that was received
by the Central Oklahoma Community Action Agency.
And this agency is going to be assisting
other nonprofits with their grant writing efforts.
And it's cool to see other agencies come
along and get funded to help bring in
even more resources to organizations that are deserving.
They're going to be assisting them, helping
them with things such as research preparation,
submissions of other grant applications.
And it's really nice to see that happening.
And I'm looking at and seeing what's
happening with the school that I highlighted
earlier and seeing agencies doing something similar.
So it's really nice to see how when
an organization is funded with resource, how they
can continue to pay it forward.
And I think part of what a lot of
people who are grant professionals, we are in this
because we want to pay it forward.
We want to do more good.
And when you think about grant professionals, these
are some of the coolest, nicest, most giving
us people on the face of the surf.
Now, with that being the case, I want my grant
professionals out there not to be taken advantage of.
So remember, know your worth.
And I want to encourage you to
continue to do your great work.
Let's take a look at a couple of other things
that we have going on out in this space.
We have others that are receiving grants.
And I'm looking over there was a new hire that
took place, and this person that I'm going to tell
you about has been doing some good work.
It looks like over in the Durango Herald,
there's a story that talks about a grant
writer using storytelling to capture their audience.
And this organization is out there helping, and
they're using the whole art of storytelling.
And if you didn't get an opportunity to on the
last episode well, two episodes back, I had an interview,
and this interview was with Michael over in Kenya, and
he had some very interesting things to talk about as
it related to storytelling as well.
You might want to go back and check out that
episode because he used storytelling in a very powerful way.
And I'm hoping that as you do your grant
writing, that you will also use that as well.
But the article that I read highlighted some of
the work of some of the people over there.
And I'm looking right now talked about Beth Lamberson
and grant professional for over some 30 years or
so and some of their new hires that they
have and some of what they're doing.
And it was interesting, as I read through the article, to
see some of the trends and some of the trends that
you may be seeing in the whole grant writing space.
There was once a time when funders, especially foundations, they
were really not in favor of giving a lot of
funds in the area of general operating expenses.
But with everything that has happened
with COVID, that somewhat changed.
Also, remember, there was at one time not a lot
of funds going or grants going to for profit businesses.
And, you know, when COVID hit, that kind
of shifted and there were a number of
great opportunities for actual for profit business.
So one of the things that when we look
at some of these recent articles and things, it
helps us to stay aware of what's happening in
the world of grant writing today.
I want to call your attention to that article.
It had some good insight, and I was excited to
see what was happening in that area as well.
This was the Region 9 Economic Development Center.
They had just recently hired their
first full time grant writer.
And there are a lot of organizations out
there that are not at a place where
they are able to hire grant professional.
It was interesting just getting a chance
to hear and read that article.
I want to call your attention to it.
Go check it out.
But remember, as we're doing grant writing, there are a
lot of things that I want to encourage you to
make sure that you do, and that is to make
sure that you keep your fingers on the pulse.
And this show is really dedicated to that to help
just kind of keep your finger on the pulse.
Some stories and some things that
may be off of your radar.
I just want to bring it to your radar so
that you can just go and check some of them
out because it may help and inform you on what
you're doing, or you may even hear an idea of
what someone else is doing that may be helpful or
may be instructive or informative for what you're doing.
So with that being the case, I want to
encourage you to make sure that you subscribe.
If you haven't already subscribed,
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And if you have questions, I want to
encourage you to send your questions in.
You can send those to
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And who knows, I may be answering your question that
you have on one of our various shows, if you
haven't already, remember, this is
Grant Writing Today.
We highlight those things as
relates to grant writing today.
But we have some other shows that may be of
interest to you, such as our
Grant Business Show.
If you simply go to grantbusinessshow.com, that will
be something that may be helpful for you.
And if you're doing grant writing
in the educational space, don't forget,
we also have schoolswinninggrants.com.
If you go over there, it's a
show dedicated just to school grant things. Okay.
Now back to those wonderful students
out there at West School High. Okay. Did I say it right?
I hope I said it right.
Those wonderful students out there.
I want to do this.
You guys are doing something so cool.
I want to add some value to it.
And so I'm going to reach out to Ms.
Kelly McLean and to the students out there.
And I'm going to provide one of my training
courses for the next 30 days for the students
to give them some additional information to help them.
I'll be sending one of our valuable grant writing courses
out that way to them and encouraging them along their
journey so that they can continue to do great things.
Who knows?
They may be getting that $288,000 contract
next and doing some great things.
Well, my friends, I'm out of time for the day.
I know time flies when you're having fun.
I want to congratulate you guys again.
I want to wish all of you the very best and remember
to stay and continue to be brave and to be bold.
Be brilliant and take charge.
I'll see you all next time.
Have a great day and keep on having
happy grant writing until we talk again.
Have a good one. Bye.