ProTips: SSHRC Insight Grant Applications

– a wiki site where people can ask and answer questions, as well as post insight they have into the whole process

Big changes:

the categories:

  • Challenge – originality, importance, significance [how good is this project in its conception?]
  • Feasibility – is the budget appropriate, is the methodology appropriate, can all the work promised be done in time?
  • Capability – past scholarly results (grant funded, publications, etc.) for stage of career, development of talent (student training)

the balance now favours Challenge and Feasibility

  • so this is crucial, and the budget is part of your score now, so if your budget is outrageous, it will get cut and it could sink your whole proposal
  • Capability still matters, but cannot carry the day
  • when files got torpedoed, it was usually on Feasibility, then on Challenge, almost never on Capability
  1. Budget:
  2. don’t inflate
  3. don’t deflate
  4. don’t ballpark or guess
  5. provide source of quotes
  6. allow for inflation if you want
  7. don’t make unreasonable claims for computers, etc.
  8. don’t budget for an entire grad program of support
  9. do be specific about why you need to go places
  10. do demonstrate the feasibility as well as importance of your activities
  11. Student Training:
  12. don’t use as clerical support
  13. don’t use as fellowship support
  14. actually have to train them (see travel and archives, below)
  15. this means you have to show how you will train them
  16. what you will train them in – just making bibliographies or annotated bibliographies is not enough
  17. do NOT say you are going to hire them to build a web site
  18. this means thinking about the specific skills you will give them
  19. base the amount on hourly rate as provided by home institution – stipends are tricky because they can come out to ridiculously high wages
  20. Web Sites:
  21. don’t hive off on students – you should be training them how to do this work if you are going to ask someone to do it; this would sell well
  22. don’t include if you don’t have answers to significant questions re:
  23. maintenance
  24. hosting
  25. platform
  26. moderation
  27. copyright
  28. do have realistic ambitions
  29. your website will not become a mecca for all interested parties the world over
  30. it will not change the face of scholarship and become a booming online community
  31. there are already sites that do that, so better off to plug into those
  32. see the wiki for more:
  33. Bibliographies:
  34. include a note at top saying what sorts of works have been included to pre-empt nit-picking
  35. don’t cite yourself more than you have to
  36. do make sure you include all the works you mention in the proposal
  37. Travel and Archives:
  38. say why you need to go there
  39. what specific papers they hold (if uncatalogued, say so)
  40. why you need to see them
  41. if taking RA, say what training you will provide
  42. workshops, worksheets, exercises before you go
  43. account for expenses as varying with location – Rome is more expensive than Austin, TX, for example
  44. say what’s online and what’s not
  45. CV Attachments
  46. be honest and clear
  47. don’t pad or dress things up – it looks very bad

More Don’ts:

don’t say you are going to do too much – this was kod for lots this time

kmp has to be realistic and good but not world-changing

don’t reinvent the wheel – new web sites, etc.

don’t overload on RAs – this is not about funnelling money, but about training them and HQP

Here’s what the best applications do:

state clearly what the research question is OR what the argument is

state clearly that it is new – situated in relation to scholarship

state clearly why it matters – be modest here (no need to change the world)

  • also no need to speak in tech-ese or science-ese; your audience are SSH people who do not need to be convinced of the value of SSH research

state clearly how you will do it – close reading, archival work, discourse analysis, gender-based focus, computational approach, interviews (HREB)

speak clearly and in short sentences without trying to dress things up

spend most of the time talking about how they will do what they are going to do

the quality of the project is either clear or not clear right away

have a budget that is reasonable and really justified – it is detailed, rational, and sensible

have a KMP that is reasonable and serious; if your primary output will be a monograph, that’s fine – arguably better than saying you will build a web site, hold a conference, run a series of public workshops, and stage a play as well.

present a cv that shows past success with grants – if you have had one and it is not complete, you’d better say why

present a cv that shows good publication record that is not padded or misleading