ANA Funding Application Submission Tool (FAST)
Executive Summary
The Administration for Native Americans, like many other grant-making agencies across government, solicit funding requests via Funding Opportunity Announcements (FOAs). Hopeful nonprofits and tribal governments request funding by responding to solicitations that can often reach 50 to 60 pages in length.
The problem is that the organization and length of FOAs often contributes to an intimidating, confusing, and, ultimately, prohibitively difficult experience for many would-be applicants. For many smaller nonprofits and tribes that cannot afford professional grant writers, the process is simply too daunting and generally avoided altogether in spite of a well-documented need for such funding.
The Innovation: This group has used feedback from a number of applicants, grantees, and technical assistance providers to better understand that the FOA response and review experiences need to be more intuitive and organized. Without being able to change the standard FOA document itself, the group has proposed a solution similar to ‘Turbo Tax” in which a tool readily guides users through the process of developing content in order to properlyrespond to the FOA.
The leadership of the Administration for Native Americans has endorsed this project and elevated it as a key priority. It will support a pilot whereby the new Funding Application Submission Tool (F.A.S.T.) will be applied to an upcoming Funding Opportunity Announcement such that its impact can be understood and measured, with the goal being a significantly simplified application process that makes funding more accessible to the communities that ANA serves.
A project supported by the: HHS Ignite Accelerator
Team Members
David Berlin (Project Lead), ACF
Michelle Sauve, ACF
Brent Huggins, ACF
Will Post, ACF
Milestones
May 2014: Project selected into the HHS Ignite Accelerator
June 2014: Time in the Accelerator began
September 2014: Time in the Accelerator ended
Project Sponsor
Camille Loya, Director, Division of Policy, Administration for Native Americans (ANA), Administration for Children & Families (ACF)
Amy Sagalkin, Director, Division of Program Evaluation and Planning, Administration for Native Americans (ANA), Administration for Children & Families (ACF)
