Guidelines for Writing Your Grant Objectives

Grant objectives are one of the most important parts of your proposal and become the basis for an agreement between your organization and the Haas, Jr. Fund.

Your objectives should clarify what changes you expect to see as a result of your work. They should help us understand the scope and ambition of your work, goals and strategies, and clarify what indicators you will use to measure your success. Your final report should detail the progress you made in achieving these mutually agreed-upon objectives.

Although it is easy to confuse objectives with activities, we are less interested in the detailed activities you will undertake, and more interested in the broader objectives that tell us what you want to accomplish. For example, instead of telling us how many hours of training you will provide, please focus on what the people who receive the training will learn.

Please be sure to include:

  • What you want to accomplish for the clients you serve or the audience you hope to influence.
    • What is the scope and scale? Target population (e.g., ethnicity, immigrant status, geography, etc.)? Number of people you will reach and how (e.g., services or through advocacy)?
    • How will you improve or expand upon your existing work?
    • What is your time frame? (If you are applying for support for more than one year, what do you plan to accomplish by the end of each year?)
  • How you will measure your success, and how you will incorporate what you have learned into future activities.

Sample Grant Objectives

Objective 1:
Increase the civic participation of low-income immigrants in ABC communities of California.

Activities

  1. Conduct nonpartisan voter registration to register 5,000 in Treedale, Orange Grove and Berryland, three communities where Latinos and Asians comprise over 60% of the population.
  2. Engage and educate immigrants during 3 civic participation phone banking and precinct walking programs per year. Hold phone banks in Cantonese and Spanish as well as English.
  3. Mobilize 120 Latino and Asian volunteers to assist local field organizers to walk precincts for non-partisan GOTV for two election cycles this year.
  4. Conduct at least 4 talk radio show interviews in English, Spanish, Cantonese featuring voter registration discussions, reaching an estimated 1,000,000 Southern California listeners.
  5. Enlist 3 local television networks to promote nonpartisan voting by airing of PSAs.
  6. Send 6 nonpartisan text messages with reminders to register to vote/go to the polls as well as ongoing messaging to Latino and Asian youth via Facebook and Twitter.
  7. In partnership with Group A and Group B, hold four community meetings reaching a total of over 200 in English, Spanish and Cantonese in order to discuss policy and election issues.
  8. Reach out to the over 300 that indicated an interest in getting involved in efforts to advance more fair immigration policies at the local and federal levels and engage them in an ongoing basis on advocacy campaigns.
  9. Identify 30 potential leaders and offer trainings on civic participation, advocacy techniques, movement building, and media and communications tools.

Outcomes

  1. 5,000 Latino and Asian voters registered in Treedale, Orange Grove, and Berryland communities.
  2. Grassroots membership expanded to 1,900 people with a leadership body of 50.
  3. Ability to reach 50,000 immigrant voters per civic participation program.
  4. Over 250,000 community members motivated to vote through GOTV efforts and a coordinated mainstream and ethnic media campaign.
  5. Over 200 community members are educated on policy and election issues.
  6. At least 5 community members become volunteer leaders in the organization.

Objective 2:
Provide technical and legal assistance to immigrant rights advocates, community groups and local officials around the state to reform unfair immigration enforcement policies and practices.

Activities

  1. Analyze and monitor public policies and practices that criminalize the presence of undocumented persons and/or divert local police resources to assume immigration enforcement responsibilities, such as the proposed CLEAR Act, Secure Communities and xyz Program.
  2. Track all resolutions and ordinances adopted at the local level in California that compromise immigration law enforcement.
  3. Conduct at least 4 train-the-trainer trainings on police and Immigration and Customs Enforcement collaboration issues in at least six counties (Riverside, San Bernardino, Alameda, Fresno, San Diego and Los Angeles).
  4. Research policies, procedures, and costs of local agencies conducting “saturation patrols” (alternatives to checkpoints that increase the risk of racial profiling in immigrant communities); in consultation with coalition partners, Organization A and Organization B, develop strategy to address saturation patrols in those areas where they are most pervasive.
  5. Engage and train at least 12 police chiefs and sheriffs as public spokespeople on enforcement reform.
  6. Provide local community groups and public officials with messaging materials (such as a toolkit) and information (such as a model ordinance) to assist them in opposing proposals to require local police to undertake immigration enforcement duties.

Outcomes

  1. Produce at least 3 issue briefs or fact sheets on immigration law enforcement to deepen the knowledge and advocacy skills of over 100 local and regional immigrant rights advocates.
  2. Over 200 advocates in at least 6 counties of the state will be knowledgeable about car impoundment, checkpoint, and immigration enforcement issues and better able to assist their members and communities.
  3. Prepare and disseminate 1 issue brief analyzing saturation patrol proposals from the perspective of low income immigrants.
  4. Maintain an enforcement reform listserv that include 200 advocates in 22 counties for dissemination of these issue briefs, fact sheets and policy analysis papers.
  5. Provide at least 10 decision-makers with data, policy analysis and technical assistance so they can better oppose local proposals that encourage police and ICE cooperation.
  6. At least 10 articles will quote local law enforcement on the need for enforcement reform.
  7. Immigrant-serving organizations in more rural and suburban cities in California will become more engaged in statewide campaigns affecting their local communities.