Corporate & Professional Development

Successful Grant Writing - from A to Z

Writing a proposal is only one crucial part of a much larger process — namely, how to build and sustain successful, long-term relationships with foundations.

A key part of the course will be a short-term, hands-on project in a local nonprofit agency in which students — working individually or in small teams — will complete work on one or more of the following:

  • program analysis
  • prospect research
  • strategy development
  • submission of letters of inquiry and/or proposals

Students will be expected to integrate lessons from the classroom into their project assignments. In turn, each student will be expected to report back to the group during the final two sessions of the course regarding their field-based experiences. Completing the course will give students a solid understanding of best practices in how to secure grants and build effective relationships with foundations over time.

Learning Outcomes

  • identify "fundable" ideas
  • identify and vet foundation prospects
  • develop customized strategies for approaching specific foundations
  • structure and write letters of inquiry
  • draft a proposal
  • work with others in their organizations to build productive relationships with foundations over time

Instructor: David Gordon

drgordon@mit.edu

David Gordon is an Associate Director of Foundation Relations at MIT. Since 2002, he has led a four-person team that develops and manages relationships with major national foundations on behalf of two of the five schools at MIT: the School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences and the School of Architecture and Planning. Previously, David had been a foundation relations officer at Brandeis University from 1998 to 2002 and had had an extensive professional background in non-profit management and policymaking work. In all, he has been in the fundraising field for more than 15 years.

As an active member of the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) of Massachusetts, David has both chaired and co-chaired the Corporate and Foundation Relations track at the annual AFP Conference and has taught more than a dozen sessions of the AFP "Basics" introductory course on Corporate and Foundation Relations since 2004. He also has taught seminars each summer since 2003 at the Ivy/MIT/Stanford Conference on Corporate and Foundation Relations.

A native Bostonian, David graduated from the Boston Public Schools, earned his A.B. (History) from Harvard College, and earned his Ed.M. (Administration, Planning, and Social Policy) from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.