Sunday, January 20, 2008

More funding opportunities

Leo sent me an email this weekend that said something like this:

"Here's the application for that funding source I told you about. It's due Feb 1. Request $2500-300o for airfare, ground transport, basic supplies, and small per diem. Say it is seed money and next time you'll request funds for an assistant which you will recruit on this first trip. I'm one of the three people that review these proposals."

Helpful indeed! I'll get right on that.

A classmate of mine told me about another organization that supports graduate research called Idea Wild. They offer small grants to provide materials for conservation and biodiversity research. Pretty cool!

Since I submitted my first grant for supplies and equipment in December, I've thought of a few things I should have included so I'm glad to hear about these other grants. For example, I neglected to budget for research permit fees, a camera (all good fieldwork requires photographic documentation for subsequent presentations and whatnot), and offsetting emissions from travel to and from my field site. I'm not sure if emission offsets are an acceptable thing to ask for, but I think if any subset of funding organizations is likely to support it, it's conservation organizations like the ones I'm applying to. Have you budgeted for emission offsets in grants? I'd really like to hear from people who have.

About emission offsetting in general, it is somewhat overwhelming to choose how to do it. I am somewhat wary of the large "carbon-neutralizing" organizations and would really love to support a more local (either in Big City Area or my field site area) tree planting or conservation initiative. Really, I'd love to plant tons of trees in my neighborhood because it really needs them, but I don't think I can get that into a grant. I'll probably have to go with some big, established carbon offset organization for my fieldwork and think about local projects for my personal life.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

You may be able to get trees planted in your neighborhood officially. In both the town I'm from and in the town my uncle lives in (in MD) you can pay the park district to plant trees. Normally you pay half or less the cost and the park district pays the rest. You can pick your tree species and location. My mom and uncle always pick trees native to the area. You can also get a free plaque next to the tree. For example, my mom and uncle planted some trees in memory of my grandfather and the plaques say that. They picked out the tree species and locations. It’s exactly what you could do too. Anyway, it is often an official program with the park district and something you could look into.