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Tricks of the Trade for Budgets

Intermediate District 287 & Northeast Metro 916 Grants and Research Office (GRO)

  1. Be comprehensive.
    Think of everything now, so there are no surprises later.  You will need meeting space, food, and possibly release time.  You may need to use vans or public transportation or school buses; you may need to reimburse for driving distance.  Consider copies, office supplies, etc. And, of course, estimate all staff time and charges, including the time of consultants, such as trainers and evaluators.
  2. Be current.  For example, I’ll give some formulas below, but the district changes policy and government numbers (such as $.36 mileage reimbursement) change.
  3. Use Excel or another spreadsheet program, if possible, for the detailed budget.
  4. Double-, triple-, quadruple-check everything!
  5. Use the order and format shown in the proposal guidelines.
  6. Consider examples (such as the one above) for ideas about categories, format, etc.
  7. Whenever possible, use the actual wages for people who you know will be on the project (accounting for any expected pay increases, since grants usually take effect in a subsequent year than the one in which applications are made.) If you do not know exactly who will full all the positions, try to budget slightly on the high-side. - You can always come out under budget!  If necessary to cut a budget and if you think that the amounts you have used are too high, you can use an average wage for that level of staffperson. Doing so is usually a safe bet and can bring down your requested funds with little agony.
  8. Do the detailed breakdown/line item budget (sometimes called a Budget Narrative, though it is not actually a narrative, but a detailed listing or table of each expense) first and then the Budget Summary.
  9. When doing a Budget Narrative, write out all calculations. For example:
    • 200 copies x $.08/copy x 2 semesters = $32 or
    • 2 full-time site supervisors/ site x 2 sites x $30,000/ year/ supervisor = $120,000 or
    • 4 instructors x 22 hrs./week/instructor x $20/hr. x 20 weeks = $35,200
  10. Often, a “match” is required, and it is almost always desired. “Matches” or “matching funds” are funds that your school/district/intermediate/agency comes up with itself to cover costs involved in the grant project.  In other words, the granting agency doesn’t want to pay for everything. They want to see that your agency has an investment - literally as well as in spirit.  Don’t despair, if your entity (agency/school/district) does not seem to have money to cover any of the project’s costs. Most or all matching funds can often be “in-kind” amounts. “In-kind” means that your entity does not actually write a check specifically for some aspect of the project. Instead, it donates something (that it already has): staff time, phone use, office space, classrooms, meeting space, computers, etc. Every project will require things that your entity already has. People have to meet, and schools and office buildings have space to let them use. Staff has time to do some work on the project within the hours they are already paid for.  For example, do you have an office assistant who has 2 hours free a week to do the administrative work for a grant? Do you have a computer person who is on call anyway? Copy machines, telephones, computers, and other tools are already available.  Use these.  Plan them into your grant, because you will need some of them. Estimate the cost. For example, if your grant involves three training sessions from an outside trainer and you have no money to pay for the trainer, you probably do have access to space (estimate maybe $300/afternoon) in which the training can be held. That’s a $300 in-kind match per training.
  11. Nice thing to keep in mind for in-kind match: if you are giving office space to staff to use for the project, you can estimate a total of up to 25% of dedicated employees’ salaries to office set-up. That’s a nice amount of match that costs nothing but a little space and set-up.
  12. Salaries and benefits: The first section of a budget usually consists of salary and benefits.  Salary is the hourly rate.  Benefits are the additional amount (could be 17% or 25%) that salaried employees are paid to cover health insurance and other costs.   In the salary section of your budget narrative, show the per/hour amount of each project staff person and the number of hours that s/he is spending on the project. (You can group together people who are spending the same number of hours on the project and are paid the same amount per hour.) Alternatively, you can show the cost per academic year of each person, the fraction of full-time that person is giving to the project, and the total project cost for the person’s time. In benefits, list only benefits (use the percentage given to you by your entity’s administrator) for those employees who are eligible.—Consultants and some hourly, part-time workers do not receive benefits. (Note: Sometimes, consultants are listed in another section altogether. Trainers and evaluators sometimes come under that heading.  They are paid by the day, hour, or project at a higher hourly rate but without benefits.)
  13. Steps in determining total budget:
    • Come up with a reasonable budget range. Usually, this range depends on two things: the scope of your project and the average amounts that the granting agency has given in the past and/or intends to give this budget cycle. For example, if the Department of Education normally gives $100,000-$200,000 grants in this category and yours is a relatively small project, your range might be $90,000-$110,00 to be competitive. If yours is large grant and you would like $300,000 for it, you should figure that it is unlikely that you will get more than the largest amount the grantor has ever given.  Work with your proposal until you can ask for funds of maybe $180,000-$210,000. Remember you want your proposal to seem attractive and cost-effective so that the granting agency feels that they are getting a lot of good work for their money.
    • Now, draw up a comprehensive budget narrative, going back and forth between the budget and the work plan.  (In fact, it is often good to get into the details of these two grant sections at the same time.)
    • See your final amount (which will almost always be higher than it should be) and work with your budget and work plan as necessary to adjust individual and final amounts and matches.
  14. When you think your budget is finished, run it by two administrators with experience in budgeting and, possibly the accountant for your school or district.  See if the budget looks reasonable and comprehensive to them.  If not, make any changes you think make sense.  Be sure to check all your numbers again and to make sure that the line item budget (budget narrative) and budget summary match.