Upload
rudolf-brett-wheeler
View
216
Download
2
Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Northeast SARE
Webinar for Invited Professional Development Program
Grant Applicants
August 18, 2015
www.nesare.org
Purpose
Increase your understanding of the application process, so you can write a strong proposal.
Ask questions in the ‘question box’ as we go, or at the end.
Webinar will be recorded for future viewing
• Adopted by Northeast SARE’s Administrative Council in 2000.
• Views funded projects as ‘investments’
• Project framework designed to help ensure outcomes from investments.
• Outcomes: Measurable, positive changes in learning, action and condition
Achieving outcomes benefits both the grantor and grantee!
Outcome Funding
1. Beneficiaries
2. Performance target
3. Milestones
4. Engagement
5. Verification
6. Key individuals
Key Components
1. Beneficiaries
The people (agricultural service providers)
that your project will engage and educate
2. Performance Target
The specific, verifiable action(s)
beneficiaries take as a result of
participating in your project
(and sometimes also)
the benefit that results from the action.
In other words: Exactly what do you expect to happen with your target audience if your project succeeds?
Recipe for Professional Development Performance Target
3 Ingredients:
1. Number of agricultural service providers who take action to teach farmers
2. Specific actions they take, i.e. educational activities and services with farmers.
3. Scale or extent of action: How many farmers they teach; How much production the farmers manage
Recipe for Professional Development Performance Target:
Optional ingredient:
4. Measurable on-farm change: Number of farmers who adopt the project’s recommended solution
Optional means Optional. This is not required. Some projects where agricultural service providers work closely with farmers throughout the project choose to verify and report this data.
Include on-farm change in the target only if you will be able to verify it.
Example Performance Targets
20 agricultural service providers conduct educational
activities and consultations about techniques, benefits,
and challenges of planting cover crops in fields
harvested for corn silage with 250 dairy farmers who
cultivate 18,000 acres of corn for silage.
Can you identify the 3 ingredients of the performance target?
Example Performance Targets20 agricultural service providers develop and conduct
education activities about techniques, benefits, and
challenges of planting cover crops in fields harvested
for corn silage with 250 dairy farmers who cultivate
18,000 acres of corn for silage.
1: Number of agricultural service providers
2: Specific actions
3: Scale or extent of action
8 agricultural service providers deliver education
programs about the FAMACHA system of barber
pole parasite management to 320 sheep farmers
who raise 6,000 sheep.
Example Performance Targets
1: Number of agricultural service providers
2: Specific actions
3: Scale or extent of action
This target also contains Optional ingredient
4: Measureable on-farm change
Example Performance Targets
20 agricultural service providers consult intensively about
value-added business planning with 35 dairy, beef, small
ruminant, and/or fruit and vegetable farmers; 25 of these
producers complete business plans for a value-added
product; 12 educators conduct educational activities and
services about value-added business planning with 100
additional farmers who manage 8,000 acres.
Considerations for Writing a Strong Performance Target
a. How great is farmer need/interest in the problem/opportunity you will address?
b. How great is agricultural service provider interest/ motivation to learn and to teach farmers?
c. How many service provider beneficiaries will you engage?
d. What time commitment are they able/willing to dedicate to the project and follow-up farmer education?
Obtain information from agricultural service providers (and farmers if necessary) during proposal planning to helps answer these questions.
Considerations for Writing a Strong Performance Target
d. What farm audience will beneficiaries work with? Is it large? Diverse? Geographically concentrated or dispersed?
e. How complex is the farm problem your project is addressing?
f. How complex, intensive or time consuming will educational work with farmers be for the beneficiaries?
The number of beneficiaries who participate and take action will vary based on project content and design.
All beneficiaries may not conduct the same follow-up educational actions.
The performance target may contain different actions or amounts of action for subsets of service providers.
Considerations for Writing a Strong Performance Target
Strive for an ambitious, but realistic performance target.
The more information you have about:
• your beneficiary audience
• the farmers they serve
• the benefits for farmers from addressing the problem or opportunity in your project
• the risks and barriers to change that must be addressed
The easier it will be to establish an ambitious and realistic performance target.
Questions about Performance Targets?
Please type into ‘question box’ on your screen.
3. Milestones
Logical, sequential learning steps beneficiaries take as they participate in project activities.
Milestones prepare beneficiaries for the performance target (i.e. for taking action to teach farmers).
MILESTONE 230 enroll in project, attend
workshops; learn concepts A, B, C
TARGET 20 teach 250 farmers about
A, B, C
MILESTONE 3
25 attend field demo; learn and practice A, B, C
MILESTONE 1
MILESTONE 3
PERFORMANCE TARGET
MILESTONE 150 complete baseline survey about
current knowledge and learning needs
MILESTONE 2
MILESTONE 4MILESTONE 4
23 consult with PIs about farmer education plans
20
A Simplified OUTCOME FRAMEWORK
Not everyone who begins a project will complete all the milestones.
Projects designed to recruit, engage and support a committed cohort of beneficiaries are often most successful.
Think about Milestones as describing the
life of your project from the perspective of
the beneficiaries who participate.
How to Write Milestones
Milestones should describe what THEY do -- Not what YOU do
4 Ingredients:
1. The number of agricultural service providers who participate
2. The project activity they participate in to learn and build skills
3. The knowledge and skills they learn
4. The timeframe when the participation and learning occur
Recipe for a Milestone
Example Milestones100 agricultural service providers attend 4-part webinar
series and learn about market analysis and
assessment, product development, market competition
and positioning, and financial analysis and projections.
June-September 2015
Can you identify the 4 ingredients of the
milestone?
Example Milestones100 agricultural service providers attend 4-part webinar
series and learn about market analysis and
assessment, product development, market competition
and positioning, and financial analysis and projections.
June-September 2015
1. Number of service providers2. Activity they participate in3. What they learn4. Timeline – when they participate
and learn
a. Articulate essential beneficiary learning and interim action steps
b. Inform beneficiaries you have a clear plan to engage them
c. Provide a timeline for activities and learning that helps you implement project
d. Serve as monitoring tool to let you know if course corrections are needed and assure target is reached
How do milestones help you?
You will report against Milestones in annual progress reports.
Questions about Milestones?
Please type into ‘question box’ on your screen.
4. Engagement• Is what you do when you involve, teach, motivate, listen to and support beneficiaries.
• Is a key to success for Outcome Funded projects.
Getting people to come to events is relatively easy.
Obtaining commitment & Motivating action requires strong and consistent engagement.
Ways to Increase Engagementa. Involve beneficiaries in project planning
b. Inform them of the performance target and information you need from them over time
c. Provide learning opportunities through milestones that meet their needs
d. Collect ongoing feedback about their learning, skill development and confidence to teach farmers
e. Provide support – not just information… consulting, mentoring, assistance with planning and monitoring progress
Asking questions and collecting data to find out the extent to which beneficiaries:
• Achieved learning milestones
• Performed actions described in the performance target.
5. Verification
Describes:
Tools and methods for collecting data about beneficiary learning and follow-up action
The ingredients in milestones and performance targets are the items you need to ask questions and collect data about.
Verification Plan
Use the recipes as your guide.
Planned from the beginning
Done throughout project: for milestones
Target is verified after project activities (allow time for action to occur)
Requires tracking beneficiaries – who they are and what they do as result of project
Success with Verification
Tell the beneficiaries about the target andverification process -- at start of project
Collect any information needed as you go
Develop effective verification tools; share tools with beneficiaries ahead of time
Be persistent in engaging beneficiaries
Success with Verification
Questions about Verification?
Please type into ‘question box’ on your screen.
The ‘leadership team’
Serve a key role in the project
Provide letters of commitment
6. Key Individuals
Northeast SARE’SReview Process
it is interactive…
nesare.org
Preproposal feedback; this webinar
Online materials (Guide for Applicants)
Clarity questions (if needed) from first tier review panel
Second tier panel ranks all proposals
Administrative Council decides on funding
‘Pre-award’ conf. call with approved projects
Timeline
Full proposals due October 15, 2015
Clarity questions answered by email early Dec.
AC meeting in mid February
Funding decisions announced late Feb. 2016
Pre-award conference calls in March or April
Contracts issued late summer
Questions?
Find Guidance at http://www.nesare.org/Grants/Get-a-Grant/Professional-Development-Grant
Contact NESARE PDP Staff:[email protected]@uconn.edu