Thursday, April 2, 2009

Grants.gov Trouble

If you have been trying to upload a grant to grants.gov within the last several days, you have been frustrated. As many of us predicted, the grants.gov servers went down when over 27,000 agencies tried to upload applications at the same time.

Overall, grants.gov activity of all kinds has doubled in the past several months, straining the already glitchy system to a breaking point.

The grants.gov blog says that everything is fixed now, but please be aware that the warnings to start early with your uploads (not waiting until the last day) are more important than ever.

Also, you should know that several federal agencies have reverted to their old electronic grants submittal formats, stepping away from grants.gov for now, until they can be sure the glitches are all worked out.

What does this mean for YOU? You may need to register all over again on a new system that you haven't used recently. Here are our tips for success in this interesting period of many opportunities and much competition:

  • Read the directions very carefully on any grant you are considering. Pay attention to submittal instructions.
  • If a new or different electronic submittal process is included in the RFP, register early.
  • Set your own deadline of about 3 days before the actual grant deadline so you can be sure you resolve any submittal issues with plenty of time to spare.
  • Most importantly, don't let this unprecedented windfall of special grant opportunities pass you by! Don't just search grants.gov my agency for opportunities. Look at all of the available FY 09 Recovery Act grants. You will probably find one or more that is a perfect fit for your community in an unexpected category.

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About Creative Resources & Research

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Woodland, CA, United States
Creative Resources and Research is a consulting firm specializing in grant writing, grant seeking, program evaluation and professional development training. We have worked with hundreds of clients including public and private schools, school districts, universities, non-profit organizations, and social service agencies throughout California, securing over $155 million from federal, state and private foundation funding sources over the past decade. Our primary grant writers and program evaluators have over 50 years of combined experience in the education and social services fields. At CRR we prefer a personal approach to the clients we work with; by developing long term relationships, we are better suited to match client’s needs with available funding sources. We provide a variety of services to help assist you, including grant writing, evaluation consulting, professional development opportunities, and workshops.