There are still some questions floating around about dealing with the EOI form that I want to address.
In last night’s class, I talked about how to fill out the form (right at the beginning, so you don’t need to watch the whole thing to find the information). I recommend you watch the recording, but I’m going to give you a run down here to try to catch all the questions in one go.
But before I get to that, I just want to reiterate why I’ve given you a not-particularly-flexible form to work with. Grant application forms are not designed with good user experience in mind. They’re designed to support administration, and they are consequently not easy for applicants to work with. I don’t want to put arbitrary hurdles in place, but you do need to know how to work with an inflexible form and still convey your key messages effectively. I’m not trying to make your lives more difficult. I’m trying to make this an authentic learning experience that allows you to think about how you put information together to achieve an aim – in this case, to win funding.
The applicant details section
Here’s a crib sheet on what to put where:
- Enter funding body’s name: This is where you indicate the organisation who is offering the grant program. It can be a fictitious grant program. You don’t need to find a real program to apply for.
- Library service: This is where you indicate the organisation you (as the proposer of the project) work for. Write the name of the library here.
- Library manager: The name of the manager of the library service you work for.
- Project lead: The person who is running the project (i.e. one of the students in your team).
- Project team member 1 and 2: The other members of your team. Doing the assignment solo? Leave these blank. Doing the assignment in a pair, leave the fields for project team member 2 blank.
The project description section
Aims and objectives
Paola tweeted a link earlier today to a useful blog post about the difference between aims and objectives, which you might find useful. In summary, aims are big picture and can be a little bit aspirational or even visionary (but they should be achievable, as the blog post points out). You would usually only have one or maybe two aims. Objectives are actionable, specific and measurable. You might have several objectives.
User needs
You’ll touch on user needs when you talk about aims, objectives, purpose etc, but we’re not asking you to complete the sections of the full grant application that deal with user needs for this assignment.
Project overview
Provide the clearest possible description of your proposed project so we can give you good feedback. Describe exactly what your program, product or service will do, how it will work, what it will look like etc.
Something to keep in mind here: you are going to find this hard to do in 500 words unless you are very clear on what *not* to include. Take a look at the full grant application form and make sure you are not providing lots of detail on things that will be covered elsewhere in the final submission.
Word / character limits
Yes, the assignment has word limits. But it’s not possible to restrict the form based on words – only on characters. The character limits I set should have been enough to allow you to write over 500 words, but of course this will vary depending on the words you use. Big words = more characters.
If you can’t fit your 500 words into the box, simply turn off form protection and you’ll be able to write more.
Don’t know how to turn off form protection? You need to use the Developer ribbon. A quick Google search will help you find instructions. Alternatively, download an unprotected version.
Working with an unprotected form?
You must make sure you:
- self manage the word limit – it’s your job to make sure you don’t go over
- only use Calibri 10 point – you can use bold, but that’s it!
Reference lists
Submit your reference list as a separate document. Use the file naming convention specified on the assignment page. You’ll deposit this in DropItToMe along with your expression of interest form.
Still got questions?
Please ask away, but note I’m generally in meetings for most of every day, so I may not be able to respond to your tweets or forum posts til the evening.
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