Fundraising Manual
Fundraising Manual
Fundraising
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FUNDERBREAKDOWN
Funder Breakdown
What became obvious Events
Bingos/
Special
to us was the striking Casino
1%
Corporate 1%
1%
lack of diversity in
Private
5%
funding sources. As you Municipa
Foundation 27%
can see in the next 19%
Funder Diversity
FUNDERDIVERSITY
This lack of diversity in Half or more of
All Funding from
funding from only
funding was identified only100%
oneonesource
source
two
50%+sources
2 sources 21%
29%
by many organizations 29% 21%
as a major barrier to
50%
achieving adequate,
sustainable funding for 70%+ one source
Over 70% of 50%
their projects and funding from only
programs. Some one source
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identified their concern and frustration at being dependent on short-term grants and
contracts. Others said they didn’t know where to look for grants, didn’t feel confident
they had the skills to write them, or didn’t have time to network with other
organizations and share funding ideas.
In order to de-mystify the grant writing process a little we put together a grant writing
workshop based on our experiences at EYA. This is what we have learned about grants
over the years.
What is a grant?
A grant is financial $$$s contribution given by a big organization. These organizations
are usually the following:
• Government - federal, provincial, municipal
• Corporations - banks, manufacturers, etc
• Foundations - people with big bucks who want tax breaks and to do good charity
work set up an organization
• Private - direct donations
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Whentowritethem
• Governments work on a fiscal year of April 1st to March 31st, and usually run out
of grants by end of calendar year or sooner
• Corporations usually set their budget every calendar year, so they run out of $$s
in early fall
• Personal donations are best in the few months leading up to March, including
holiday December, as that is when people do their taxes and need their tax
deductions
• Foundations are year round and depend on their grant deadlines.
Schmooze
One aspect that almost everyone hates to do in youth organizations is ‘schmooze’ or
‘brown nose’. Sadly, it needs to be done if you want to get a higher percentage of grants
you apply for. Set-up meetings, talk to people on the phone, send them information
about your organization, and in the most crass terms, sell yourself.
Make Friends
Bureacrats are people too … if you treat them like people who are doing a legitimate
job you’ll get a lot farther in your fundraising. Often we blame bureaucrats for the type
of grant, how much money the grant is for, etc. They can’t control these factors so don’t
shit on their head. They also have insider knowledge about what’s going on, which is
invaluable to getting grants. Often times we try to get politicians to support our
projects. This is great, as long as it is positive … don’t get into or start a war between
politicians and bureaucrats … you will lose.
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Apply,Apply,Apply
Fundraising is + project and + relationship. Often the first time you apply is just a
getting to know you phase. Apply again. Go in and talk to the funder and find out why
they didn’t fund the last proposal. Don’t take rejection of your proposal as a rejection of
you, your cause and your organization.
TITLE
Your title should be an attention grabber. It should represent what you want to do, but
it should also be fun. If you have a good title, they may not need to read much of the
rest of the grant.
NEED
Explain the needs of your clientele, adding any outside statistics or demographics that
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support your case. You can talk about larger societal problems or pressures that affect
your target group, as well as successes from other organizations that have done similar
work if you want.
OBJECTIVES
These should be short and concise. They can be point form. You can include long-term
as well as short-term goals.
METHOD
Chronological (month by month) list of activities that will take place over the course of
the project.
ORGANIZATIONAL QUALIFICATIONS
In this section you should briefly outline the history, status and mandate of your
organization, why you are interested in this project, and why you think you will be able
to coordinate it well. Give short bios of the project coordinators, the names of support
staff and board or directors if you have one.
EVALUATION
Include qualitative as well as quantitative evaluation techniques i.e. monitoring and
surveys.
BUDGET
Should include in kind funding/donations as well as the amount you are asking from
your potential funder.
Grant Proposals
What should it look like ...
ExecutiveSummary
Do up an executive summary so the funder should
Partners
THE OTOMI
The Otomi live in Central Mexico. The principal communities that will be participating
will be Tultepec and San Mateo Atenco in Mexico State.
These communities are close to self sustaining in the area of food production and have
a thriving textile industry selling internally in Mexico, and, in a limited way, exported to
Canada. In Canadian terms these communities would be seen as very poor, yet their
small business enterprise sector is thriving in Mexican terms.
Their primary industry is in textile/arts and crafts production. They have created small
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• jewellery
• pottery
• handicrafts in general (glass, wood, beads, leather, tule and so on)
The artisans and distributors within the community have created and expanded a niche
within the Mexican tourist trade. The community has defined a market for the artesinal
goods, and created a production and distribution system to move those goods to
market. As well, with the connection with the Shushwap of Alkali Lake, the Otomi
artisans have begun to export their goods to Canada.
These enterprises are not huge, yet they sustain families and the community directly.
The enterprises are:
• not ones that have been imposed upon them
• stem directly from the cultural and historical roots within the community and
• draw upon the entrepreneurial ability of the community members
For the above listed reasons, these enterprises also have one other key component: they
are sustainable.
THE SHUSHWAP
The Shushwap live in a broad area in Central B.C. This project will focus on one of their
more well known communities, Alkali Lake. Located near William’s Lake in Central B.C.,
Alkali Lake is well known for its stunning turnaround in the 1970’s and 80’s from a
community rife with alcoholism to one which is now 95% sober.1 Through an exchange
program between the two partners and EYA in 1995 the Shushwap were able to connect
with the Otomi. Community members of Alkali Lake (approximately 20, both youth and
adult community leaders) who went to Otomi communities on this and succeeding
exchanges have been extremely impressed with the self sufficiency of the Otomi
communities, especially in the area of small enterprises The Alkali Lake community
members believe that the similarities which exist between the two communities - both
cultural and historical - would allow similar small enterprises to flourish in their own
community.
Some of the key components that have impressed the Alkali Lake members have been
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that
• the small enterprises come from resources which exist within the community
• are based on the communities collective cultural knowledge and skills, and
• are not grandiose schemes but small and sustainable enterprises which benefit
the community directly.
From this the Alkali Lake members feel that a small enterprise training program with an
international component in Mexico would be of great benefit to the youth from Alkali
Lake.
Program Activities
The program would be 1 year in length and involve 5 youth participants from Alkali
Lake, 5 community members knowledgeable in the Alkali community and 1 coordinator.
A like number of Otomi would be involved. EYA would provide two youth trainers and
administrative support.
ACTIVITIES
Month 1
Alkali Lake: Member from Alkali, Mexico and EYA meet to plan general program
Month 2
• youth and community participants selected
Month 3 - 6
Training begins with Shushwap and Otomi in respective countries
• language training
• small business training
• cross cultural training
• computer training
• internet commerce
Month 5 - 8
An exchange between Otomi and Shushwap partners
• participant workshops on small enterprises in Mexico and Canada
• group work projects to assist small businesses
• participants in singles or in pairs work with small enterprises
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• bi-weekly workshops planned to reflect on experience, ie. skills in small business
EX
Month 5 - 8
Shushwap and Otomi community reps
• A working group is struck in each community regarding international economic
linkages that can be made
Month 11
Shushwap and Otomi plan culturally based small businesses
• group comes back together, creates ideas on how they can apply their knowledge
in Canada and Mexico
• create game plan for return to home
Month 12
Travel to Canada
• debrief of experience
• work on implementing game plan
Documentationofproject
An overall success of the Shushwap has been the creation of the Honour of All, National
Film Board video documenting their community’s journey from alcoholism to sobriety.
The groups feel that this type of documentation is key to passing on information gained
from this experience to other First Nations groups. This project will be video
documented to allow that to happen. This will also be a learning experience for both
the Otomi and the Shushwap youth in the area of multi-media production.
SampleBudget
Budget
Youth Service Canada
Jungle in the Concrete (22 Week Program)
Coordinators total YSC
1 @ 24 wks x 40hrs/wk x 13/hr 12,480.00
1 @ 24 wks x 40hrs/wk x 18hr 17,280.00
bookkeeping (24*13*14) 4,368.00
employment costs (11.02% of staff costs) 3,760.91
total administration costs 37,888.91
OVERHEAD
rent (650x6months) 3,900.00
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Administration
Administration money is the most important but also the hardest to get. It includes
everything that we use behind the scenes, such as: light, paper, pencils, computers,
bookkeeping, employer costs, etc. It also often includes coordinators’ salaries. Most
granting agencies allow you 10-15% of your total budget as administration. Many grants
do not give salary costs within their administration, or give no administration at all.
What usually ends up happening is you get the grant run around. You want money for a
project, but you need administration money in order to run the project. If your funder
will only give you 15% of your administration money then you end up having to write
more and more grants just to get pay your salary and bills so that you can run the
project.
Solutions
Some ways to reduce these barriers are to work with other organizations and to
fundraise in other ways. As a critical mass it is easier to pressure funders to support
your work by giving you core funding. As well, as a coalition of groups you can share
fundraising ideas and contacts. It is also important to look for ways to diversify your
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funding base. The less dependent you are on one or two major funding sources the
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better.
Thingstoremember…
• Grants take time to write and don’t turn aroundquickly, give yourself three
months.
• grant deadlines and procedures change. never assume that what you have
written on the page is correct...especially with the government. Always phone
and ask.
GovernmentProgram
AIDS AND HEALH
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