How to Write a
Proposal
A proposal is a very important document. In some cases, a concept note
precedes a proposal, briefing the basic facts of the project idea. However, the
project idea faces a considerable challenge when it has to be presented in a
framework. The proposal has a framework that establishes ideas formally for a
clear understanding of the same. Besides, unless the ideas are documented in
writing, they do not exist. Hence, a proposal facilitates appropriate words for
the conception of an idea.
Persuasive, cohesive proposals are key to winning funding for
artists/journalist/organizations from private foundations, the government and
individuals. Writing grant proposals is generally thought to be something that
is extremely difficult and time-consuming, It doesn’t have to be. What
distinguishes one proposal from another is thoughtful, systematic and cohesive
writing.
Journalists know that an effective article tells the reader who, what, where, when, why, and how.
Well-written, interesting grant proposals should do the
same for their readers and, in the process, tell a compelling story. Before you
start writing, think about how you can combine the 5W’s and the H to write a
complete grant proposal that will capture reviewers’ imaginations:
Think about who you are and who you subject is. This falls into
two broad categories:
- Give a brief history of who are
you.
- Describe your subject.
You should be able to describe succinctly what you are going to
do.
If you have a target area, define it. “Inner-city Dublin” might
be one. In addition, describe where project will take place.
A project will usually last for a period of time.
Your project should have some rationale behind it.
- Why are you targeting who you are
targeting?
- Why have you decided on what you
will photograph?
·
Why have you decided on particular times?
- Take
each of the above “W’s” and then ask yourself why did you described them
in the way you did. The “why” should be emphasized in the needs assessment
section and also threaded through other sections.
You should decide how your project will be implemented. This
incorporates all the previous elements and explains, for example:
·
How you will engage with your subject?
·
How you will make sure participants continue in the project?
·
How you will evaluate the project’s effectiveness?
This should be the longest or second longest section of your
proposal. It should explain all aspects of the mechanics of how a project will
be carried out, and it should also demonstrate that the applicant has
thoroughly considered the project and its details. This section will usually be
called something like the “Project Description.”
If you can explain the 5W’s and the H to
yourself, you’re on your way to writing a winning application!
Here are some tips on how
to write a winning proposals:
·
Begin with the need statement, a description of the artistic
need that your project is addressing. (Some refer to the need statement as the
“problem” statement.)
·
Support your need statement with persuasive evidence such as
slides, photographs, news reports, etc.
·
Use language and a format that are easy to read and understand,
and be sure your need statement is consistent with your ability to respond to
it responsibly.
Next develop the goals
and objectives. Simply put, a goal is the end result that the objectives help
you to reach.
·
One way to write a good objective is to start your objective
statement with wordings that suggest a purpose, such as “to reduce,” “to
increase,” “to decrease,” and “to expand.” Here’s an example: “The objective of
my photographic exhibition is to address the issue of child labor in South
Asia.”
·
Objectives must be clear and concise. Your goals and objectives
should tie directly to the need statement. The grant reviewer needs to be able
to figure out that by the time the goals and objectives are met, the problem or
need statement will have been addressed.
Then comes the
methodology section, which refers to the methods you will use to reach your
objectives. A method is a detailed description of the activities or strategies
to be implemented in order to achieve the end goal. This is the section in
which you explain what methods you will be using for the artistic project and
why you have selected those specific methods. The following tips can increase
your chances of writing an effective methodology:
·
Specify the activities that need to be done to meet the
objective.
·
State the starting and ending dates of the project.
·
Name the person(s) responsible for completing each activity.
·
Spell out the criteria for selecting participants.
·
Tell why this particular method was chosen.
·
Specify the population you are looking at and how they will be
chosen.
Finally, the evaluation
section is
where you show how you will measure the degree of success in meeting the
objectives in the grant application. The fewer objectives you mention in the
proposal, the easier it is to develop the evaluation plan, which should include
several things:
·
The program’s objectives and how you (and the assessor and the
public) will know if they have been met.
·
The data that will be collected to evaluate the project.
·
How the data will be analyzed.
·
Who will provide a report of the artistic project.
·
Closely tied to evaluation is dissemination. Most private
foundations want their applicants to share the findings of the project with
others. Dissemination refers to the spreading of the information, which can be
achieved via a report, video, book, conference, radio program or any combination
of these.
Your proposal needs to be between 500-700 words.
PROPOSAL EXAMPLE
“There proceeds steadily from that place a stream of
events which are a source of danger to me,” wrote the Irish born writer,
Rebecca West in 1937. “That place” was Yugoslavia and the immediate “source of
danger” was the recent assassination of its king, Alexander I, which West
feared might, like the assassination of Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo in 1914,
lead to war.
Realizing that to know nothing of an area “which threatened her
safety” was “a calamity”, she embarked on a journey through Yugoslavia. The
result was Black Lamb and Grey Falcon. Initially intended as “a snap book” it
spiraled into half a million words, a portrait not just of Yugoslavia, but also
of Europe on the brink of the Second World War, and widely regarded as one of
the masterpieces of the 20th century.
I propose retracing West’s journey and re-interpreting
her masterpiece by using photography, in the order to produce a body of work
that aims to develop the understanding of the historical, socio-economical and
political issues affecting the Balkan Peninsula, and their effects on the
history of Europe and its future.
I will follow West’s itinerary exactly, starting in Zagreb, moving
through Bosnia, Serbia and Macedonia, and ending in Kosovo and Montenegro,
at each stage comparing my experience to hers. What did she see? What do I
see? What has changed? What is continuous? Many of the issues affecting
this region are intractable - “There have been many times when the
scene unfolding before my eyes seemed to have been faithfully enacted from
the pages of Black Lamb and Grey Falcon,” wrote Geoff Dyer in 1993.
Equally, the seventy years since West’s journey, including the WWII, the
Tito era, and the 1991-95 civil war, have brought unexpected changes. Black
Lamb and Grey Falcon will act as the foundation from which to assess these
changes.
I have spent last 5 months researching and preparing the itinerary
for my journey. In order to do that I have established contacts with
West’s biographer Carl Rollyson, The International Rebecca West Society,
University of Tulsa, and the University of Yale that have Rebecca West’s
diaries in their collection. I am also invited to present my initial work
on this project at The International Rebecca West Society conference in
New York, September 2011.
This work will eventually develop into a book that is
aimed at the inhabitants of the region; at the many in Europe and beyond who
share my fascination with the region; and at all those interested in Europe’s
history and its future (the region’s recent civil war was, among other things,
a failure of EU foreign policy, and the shortcomings which were then exposed
have yet to be addressed). West inserts herself into the narrative as
questioning outsider; I will comment as a returned émigré. The planned book
will serve as both an invaluable contemporary record, and as a way of drawing
attention, in the 70th anniversary of publication, to West’ s masterpiece and
to the importance she attached to this region, where there is no ‘end of
history’.
As I mentioned above, I will follow West’s itinerary
exactly. She visited Yugoslavia three times. I plan to do the same. My first
journey will start at Easter 2011 in Zagreb, Croatia. The plan is to make an
entire journey in two parts by the end of 2011. First trip will cover Croatia,
Bosnia and Serbia. Second journey will include Macedonia, Kosovo and Monte
Negro. The third trip will be done over the course of 2012. In order to do that
journey, I will expand on the original itinerary to include sites that came to
prominence during the last seventy years, or since her last visit; the mass
graves of Bosnia, the neglected communism themed parks, the tomb of the former
dictator Tito, etc. The themes of nationalism and violence are interwoven into
a very spirit of those lands and is something I wish to explore and confront,
being of conflicting national backgrounds myself; half Croatian and half Serb
(and now Irish as well).
