Grant Writers???

[AkanaAnash]

Anyone out there with experience in writing grants for faith based communities?

[Ashleigh]

Well, I'm a writer (actually, that's a little pretentious of me to claim. An aspiring writer would be a more accurate term).

I'm not familiar with grants for faith based communities, though. In fact, I don't even really know what that is, and I'm curious. Could you explain more about it?

[juliaki]

I've done grant writing in the past, but it was about a decade ago. I can't stand the stuff, even though the pay for being a professional grant writer can be insanely high.

A couple options....

I believe Cherry Hill Seminary has a course on grant writing that they offer from time to time:

http://cherryhillseminary.org/admission ... tings.html

Also, there's a Pagan Leadership conference in Richmond, VA this year that has taught grantwriting in the past, if I'm not mistaken:

http://www.paganleadership.org/

[AkanaAnash]

Juliaki,

Thanks but I'm in Beijing. Even if it has an online component, I don't have a credit card.

Yah, it can be tedious like doing trigonometry for fun, eh?

Ash,

I know exactly where you are. I'm a writer too and when I first
understood that there was such a thing, I thought...oh...no problem, I could do that.

The reality though, is that writing Grant applications is like an exact science.
There is a certain vocabulary one has to know (like being a lawyer) and
a specific way it has to be written, which...to make things more complicated,
varies depending on the type of grant for which one is applying and sometimes, on the individual people who are on the board of trustees
of the Grants Foundation.

A Grant writer is also like a notary public in that they have to know the qualifications and requirements of most of the Foundations and also, is their job to know which organizations would be more likely to issue the Grant for specific purposes.

In this case, as a faith-based initiative, the Grant writer would have to know which Foundations would be inclined to award the grant to a non-christian organization (and that won't be easy) such as the Sharayat and be able to creatively illustrate why the Sharayat is "more worthy" to receive the money than a more established organization.

Thet

[Ashleigh]

Gosh, just reading that gave me a headache. THat's why I opted to be a novelist rather than a lawyer, lol.

No, I'm more into creative writing. I write short stories, memoirs and that sort of thing.

^_^

[juliaki]

If you're out of the country in which you're applying for a grant, you will likely find it difficult to get grant money anyhow. First preference goes for people within any "home country" for government-funded grants. If there are leftovers, they might be doled out to people on "friendly terms". (And right now, I don't think there's any country in the world that likes China, which would make it challenging for you in particular. For that reason, you may also have trouble getting funded from private institutions, too.)

[AkanaAnash]

Thanks Juli,

Thats just the kind of info I need.

I'm actually just "window shopping" right now.
I know I don't have the resources to make this happen
quite yet...but I'm keeping all the options open.

I'm not planning on building the community here.

Are you aware of any international orgz that do this sort of thing?

Thet

[juliaki]

Only Christian ones really put money toward foreign investment for faith-based initiatives that I've seen.

[AkanaAnash]

Yah...but there's GOT to be something somewhere...

Keep your eyes open people!!!

We're looking for groups/organizations/foundations...with money....who'll support a Pagan faith based initiative!!!


Thet

[juliaki]

Out of curiosity, what type of "faith-based" initiative are you looking to start? There's already dozens of pagan charity organizations already established that every year have to fight to keep up and running for lack of funding. Are you going to be taking away from those already established organizations by doing the same type of things they're trying to do?