The Individual’s Guide to Grants

Book excerpt: This book is a work of conscience. It is the product of a long-standing feeling of obligation on my part to write something useful for a special group of people to which you probably belong-individuals who seek grants. In my years as Director of the New York library of The Foundation Center, * each and every day I encountered numbers of individuals look ing for grant money. Although I tried to be as supportive as possible, in the face of the particular problems shared by this group of library users, my own reaction was one of relative helplessness. Simply stated, most of the fund-raising guides, printed directories, and computer files purport edly created to serve the fund-raising public are of little or no use to individuals who seek funding on their own. These resources are directed *The Foundation Center is the independent, nonprofit organization established by foun dations to provide information for the grant-seeking public. vii viii I PREFACE toward the nonprofit, tax-exempt agency, which is the most common recipient of foundation, corporate, and government largess. They are not designed to respond to the special requirements of the individual grant seeker. In the applicant eligibility index, the Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance defines individuals as "homeowners, students, farmers, artists, scientists, consumers, small-business persons, minors, refugees, aliens, veterans, senior citizens, low-income persons, health and educational professionals, builders, contractors, developers, handicapped persons, the physically afflicted." In short, practically everyone qualifies.