During this week, please do the following.
- Step 1: By Wednesday, please post a link to an RFP for some course of action or issue you want to support. (Test your link! If you cannot provide a direct link, please provide a PDF or other copy.) Please say what kind of support this grant provides.
- Financial: Many grants are for cash, which a grant project manager then decides how to spend.
- Material: Some grants offer material support primarily, typically in the form of software/equipment or cash dedicated specifically towards equipment or material.
- Information: Some request documents are RFIs, requests for information, which will require some specific research skill on your part.
If you are using Grants.Gov, you can paste the opportunity number (let us know that’s what it is), or look for the “Link” option in the top-right corner of the page.
- Step 2: By Friday, please respond to the person above you (the first poster gets to respond to anyone). Identify the following in the proposal they posted.
- Territory: What is the domain or type of problem that this proposal is set in?
- Gap: What is the problem that needs to be solved?
- Goal: What is the solution to the problem?
- Means: How is the problem solved? Or, how will it be solved if the audience acts?
Process
Please note that I intentionally weight discussion boards towards simple participation, rather than making some number of discussion points. I want you to engage with each other, but I don’t want to force it. To that end, our course discussion board is going to be … weird.
Whenever you post, please write at the top of your post “Discussion X-Y,” where X is the discussion number and Y is the step number (1 or 2). That’s what I’ll use as a signal for which assignment you’re doing, if any (or if you’re just responding to a peer for funsies).
This is going to make a pretty giant mess when it comes to grading, so I’ll try to give feedback as quickly as possible, but getting the points in the book will be another matter entirely.
Grading
Discussion boards in this class are all worth 5 points. The first post is worth 2, and it is graded on whether or not it was completed on time. The second post is worth 3 points, split between the quality of your response and the timeliness of it.
Step 1: You’ll get 2 points if you post your initial proposal example by Wednesday night. (Obligatory wiggle room statement: I’ll start checking Thursday morning, but your peers might be looking sooner.)
Step 2: You’ll get 2 points if you cover all four items (Territory, Gap, Goal, Means) in your response, and if your response is up by Friday night. You get 1 point just for attempting this step.
