PULLMAN – Grant proposals funded in 2009 are an impressive testament to the skills acquired by WSU faculty in Stephen Russell’s “Write Winning Grants” seminar and “Mentored Proposal Writing” workshop.
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Russell |
Successful proposals developed in Russell’s programs include three prestigious individual National Science Foundation CAREER awards and a $3 million multi-disciplinary NSF Integrative Graduate Education and Research Training (IGERT) award.
This year’s seminar presentation by Russell will be 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 3, at Schweitzer Events Center, Pullman. For more information or to register, see www.ogrd.wsu.edu/Grantwriters2009.asp.
After attending the seminar, faculty are eligible to competitively apply for the “Mentored Proposal Writing” workshop, which includes online and in-person mentoring through the process of creating a proposal for submission. Contact Esther Pratt, estherpratt@wsu.edu, for more information.
Both the seminar and workshop are sponsored by the Office of Research and the Graduate School.
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Lamb |
Russell played an important role in the success of the IGERT proposal, said Brian Lamb, Regents Professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering and principal investigator of the IGERT grant. “In particular, he helped us streamline the material to hit the key points in the IGERT call,” Lamb said.
Russell-aided proposals also resulted in awards from the National Institute of Health, Department of Energy and U.S. Department of Agriculture.
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du Toit |
“I prepared a grant to submit to the USDA Western Region IPM in November 2008,” said Lindsey du Toit, associate professor of plant pathology at the Northwestern Washington Research and Extension Center at Mount Vernon.
“The review panel ranked the proposal second of those submitted, so the grant writing workshop seems to have paid off well! One reviewer said it was the best proposal they had ever read.”
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Cousins |
New faculty member Asaph Cousins, assistant professor of biological sciences, wrote four proposals using Russell’s methods in the past year. He has received funding for three of them and has yet to submit the fourth proposal.
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Beutel |
“Working in the context of the Russell workshop, and its series of deadlines, meant that I had a draft of the first pages of my proposal done six months before the full proposal was due,” said Marc Beutel, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering and NSF CAREER grant winner. “I have never had a proposal started this early, and this was a key, in combination with the many strategies outlined in the workshop, to developing a winning NSF CAREER proposal.”
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Johnson |
“The workshop itself was eye-opening, honest and worth the long work-weeks,” said Jeanne Johnson, associate professor of speech and hearing sciences who developed a proposal to the NIH. “My proposal would have looked quite different had it not been for the sage advice of Stephen Russell.”
Russell, DVM, Ph.D., is a winemaker and academician who – in the process of successfully funding his cancer research for more than 25 years – developed a methodology for proposal writing. He and his partner in Grant Writers’ Seminars and Workshops, LLC began tutoring their faculty in grant writing; their success spawned this full-time business.
In high demand across the nation, Russell offers only four workshops per year.
“He confesses a special fondness for WSU and our faculty and has agreed to return for a fourth year to coach successful grant writing,” said Esther Pratt, Office of Grant & Research Development.
“Even scholars with fine publishing records can struggle with proposal writing,” writes Robert Porter in his article “Why Academics Have a Hard Time Writing Good Grant Proposals.” “Many are surprised to find that the writing style that made them successful as academics is not well suited to crafting a winning proposal.
“To succeed at grant writing,” Porter continues, “most researchers need to learn a new set of writing skills.” Russell has designed a writing methodology for proposals that has been repeatedly proven successful.
The full-day seminar is conceptual, practical and comprehensive. Russell teaches a methodology that includes time management as well as strategies for organization and writing the various sections of the grant proposal. He provides advice that is broadly applicable across multiple agencies as well as specific agency-unique tips and hints.
