How to Find Grants & Resources

September 5, 2006

There are hundreds of websites out there that can help you find the funding you need. Most have searchable grant databases that list contests, foundation grants, state grants, or federal grants. The user can usually search by geography, grade level, amount of grant, type of grant, deadlines, or other criteria.

Some databases are free and managed by the federal government. Some are run by for-profit businesses, but offer free access to the grants databases because they want to encourage users to try one of their products. Other sites require payment, usually via monthly or annual subscriptions. These usually have a one- or two-week free trial period.

In addition to the grant databases, you can also receive, or pay to receive, access to e-newsletters, action plans, grant tracking tools or deadline reminders, grant- or state-funding experts, grant writers or analysts, consultants who can assist you with your school-vendor contracts, etc.

This webpage lists several recommended sites, and attempts to identify the creator of each site, as well as features that are unique to each site. The grant-database sites are sorted according to whether they’re free or not.

We wish you luck with identifying the best grant for your organization. We wish you more luck writing the winning grant that will provide money to your stakeholder(s), whether it’s your community, school, administrator, teacher, or student!

FREE--FEDERAL

http://www.tea.state.tx.us/opge/disc/
The Texas Education Agency has a list of major discretionary grants for public schools in Texas. TEA also posts a frequently updated calendar that lists grant opportunities as well as specific grant announcements: http://www.tea.state.tx.us/opge/disc/mastercalendar/MasterCalendar_8-31-06.pdf

http://www.grants.gov/
This is a governmental resource listing over 1,000 award grants, totaling around $400 billion in annual awards. 26 federal agencies are required to post their competitive grant opportunities to this site. The site requires a password, but is clear and very easy to figure out, and receives over 1 million hits per week. The best news is that, as of 2003, there is only one application for all grants.

http://www.GovBenefits.gov
This online tool is free and easy-to use and created by the U.S. government. The best way to use this site is to go to the Keyword Search at the top left of the screen and choose your state and enter the word “education” and hit the GO button. A list of program will appear; these programs can reimburse Advanced Placement testers, supply funding for early literacy programs (Head Start), help educate children with disabilities (IDEA), etc.

http://www.ed.gov/about/offices/list/oese/programs.html
This U.S. Department of Education site has lots of information on how to obtain formula programs and funding. It’s created by the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education.

FREE—FOR-PROFIT BUSINESS

www.grantsalert.com
This site is created by two grant writers, one a former high school teacher, and contains listings of several hundred grants. Watch out for the Google ads at the top and to the left. (The best strategy is to go straight to the center of the page and use the top Select A Category pull-down to navigate your way to the grant opportunities.) The “federal” and “foundation” sections have the best grants, ranging from money for science teachers, to financial awards for teachers who use music to teach math, to funding for a school skate park, to the opportunity to receive second-hand computers from the government. There’s also a directory filled with grant writers.

http://www.grantwrangler.com/
This site is free. It’s operated by Nimble Press, a for-profit business that created both a product that helps grant-giving organizations manage their grants (Nimble Net) and a product that helps teachers and schools search for grants and contests (Grant Wrangler™).

http://i.cmpnet.com/techlearning/pdf/specialadvertisingsection/DELL_2006calendar.pdf
This site is free and operated by Dell Corporation. It’s a calendar with deadlines and hyperlinks to all kinds of grants that will be disbursed throughout the school year.

http://www.techlearning.com/resources/grants.jhtml
This database is well organized and contains a limited number of grants, carefully organized by category. It’s created by the Technology & Learning magazine.

http://www.renlearn.com/FundingCenter/fundingassistance/default.asp
It’s free to search their online grant search database. Renaissance Learning also offers separate services that do require fees, including a grant writing service, a grant review specialist, a grant identification specialist, and a grant writing tool kit. The prices for these services are not listed on their website.

FEE REQUIRED (subscription based)

http://www.schoolfundingcenter.com
This site is created by the School Funding Center, a for-profit company based in Pittsburg, Texas. You can purchase grant-writing books, or subscribe to the grant database--$400 for a 12-month subscription. The site states that their database contains over 110,000 federal, state, and foundation grants worth over $6.5 billions dollars. There are grants for after-school, at-risk, children with disabilities, ESL, vocational programs, and more.

http://www.schoolfundingservices.com
The School Funding Services is a database product created by RedRock Reports and the Market Data Retrieval (MDR) Company. The annual subscription for the standard edition is $5,500 and includes 5 logins. The annual subscription for the professional edition is $9,500 and includes 8 logins. There are other resources, such as action plans, analysis tools, webcasts, newsletters, email alerts, and trend reports, according to which edition you select.

http://foundationcenter.org/
This site is created by the Foundation Center, and was initially created to help nonprofits find foundation grants. There’s a basic grant database that’s free. There’s a more comprehensive product, The Foundation Directory, that costs as much as $2,500 annually, depending on the resources and the number of users. There’s also a free weekly newsletter that sends out Request for Proposals bulletins for private, corporate, and government funding sources; just click on the Newsletters link at the top of the page.

http://www.technologygrantnews.com/
This site is created by Technology Grant News magazine. For $35 per year, you can receive 4 editions of the magazine. For $85 per year, you can receive 4 electronic and print editions of the magazine. Both subscriptions will allow you to access to one free grant index of your choice—city, corporate, educational technology, federal, school, science, etc.

RESOURCES FOR STUDENTS

http://www.careervoyages.gov/
The Career Voyages site is free and has many resources for students, including student and parent action plans; online career advisors: career videos: and more. It lists the education required to enter each field, as well as statistics, salaries, and inside looks at a variety of popular professions. The site is maintained by the US Dept of Labor and the US Dept of Education.

http://studentaid.ed.gov/
This site is created by Federal Student Aid, an office of the U.S. Department of Education. It posts action plans for elementary, junior high, and high school students, as well as parents and counselors. It’s the nation’s largest source for student aid. This office distributes over $74 billion to postsecondary students nationwide and develops and distributes the FAFSA.

http://www.govbenefits.gov/
This site is good for high school students searching for college loans, or teachers searching for additional classroom resources. Simply use the search feature at the top left.