Writing Your Proposal

A proposal is essentially a persuasive essay. You are trying to persuade a sponsor to spend their research dollars on your proposal above all others. Keep in mind the general rules for persuasive writing while you are drafting your proposal:

• Peer review is one of your greatest assets. Contact a senior or funded member of your department and ask them to read your proposal.
• Unless the solicitation forbids it (and some do) it is perfectly acceptable for you to contact the program manager and make sure your proposal is a good fit for them. If it is not, they may point you in another direction.
• Legibility is important. Use the largest font size you can. The best font (and one that some agencies require) is Arial/Helvetica. Twelve point is best but you can get away with eleven.
• Be Concise! Don’t use ten words to say what you can in five.
• Use the active voice in your writing. Keep it interesting and conversational. You want the reviewer to come away excited about your idea, not feeling like they just attended a ten hour lecture directly after an international flight.
• While good persuasive writing will address the potential flaws in an argument or direction, it should also explain why you will be able to avoid those pitfalls. Be assertive in your ideas while still acknowledging room for debate and the value of other opinions.
• Don’t use jargon or, if you need to, explain it the first time you use it. While your reviewers will be experts, not all of them will necessarily be experts in your specific field.
• The most important part of your proposal is actually not the project narrative. It is the summary. The majority of reviewers in a crowded panel arrive having only read your summary and rely on your primary reviewers to enlighten them on the project as a whole. Anyone picking up your summary should be able to understand why your project is more important that any one else’s. This is also the part of the proposal that will become part of the public record, so avoid jargon and do not include any confidential or proprietary information.
• FOLLOW THE SPONSOR GUIDELINES!! This cannot be said enough. Failure to follow the formatting and limitations imposed by the sponsor can result in the return of your proposal without review.
• Last, but definitely not least, always have others, whether they are in your department or not, read and edit your proposal. Grammar, spelling, and punctuation are important. If you misspell a word that could have been caught by spell check or another set of human eyes it is going to stand out like a sore thumb. It’s easy to fall in love with our own words and lose perspective while writing something we believe in. Another set of eyes can help spot wordiness where the author may see a cunning turn of phrase. If you ask your GCS specialist and are able to get your proposal to us with enough lead time, they will be happy to provide some editing and a pair of layman’s eyes.

If you need assistance writing your proposal, you can visit the "Proposal Writing Assistance" section of the Research Administration website for a listing of books which may help you out.

Getting Your Proposal Reviewed and Signed

At the SMHS, the signature process for externally sponsored proposals involves the review and signature of the following individuals on the SMHS Proposal Routing Form:

1. The Principal Investigator(s)
2. Corey Graves, the SMHS Grants & Contracts Officer
3. The Department Chairperson(s)
4. Dr. Edward Sauter, the SMHS Associate Dean for Research
5. Dr. H.D. Wilson, the SMHS Dean
6. The UND Research Development & Complaince Office

Information and tips concerning the completion of the SMHS Proposal Routing Form can be found on the "SMHS Proposal Routing Form" section of this website.

Routing your proposal for signatures does require the review and signature of many individuals, so please allow at least 72 hours to obtain all the required signatures.

Many items are considered during the review process, depending on the type and complexity of the proposal and other factors (e.g., use of human subjects or animals, generation of hazardous wastes, cost sharing). The following is a list of some of the items considered during review of your proposal. Feel free to review these points and make sure that your proposal is complete and ready to be submitted.

• Proposal Review Tips

If you bring your proposal to Research Administration at least 72 hours prior to the submission date, your proposal will be routed for signatures for you. You will also be able to track the signature progress of your proposal by visiting the "Proposal Routing Status" section of the Research Administration website.

Keep in mind that the routing of electronic proposals requires that both a hard copy and an electronic version of your proposal be submitted to the Research Administration Office for signatures.

Submitting Your Proposal

Once your proposal has been reviewed and signed by all the required individuals at the SMHS, the final signature is that of the UND Research Development & Complaince Office, located in Twamley Hall. Once they have reviewed and signed your proposal, they will call the individual who is notated on the bottom of the SMHS Proposal Routing Form. It is then up to the Principal Investigator to pick up the proposal and submit it to the sponsor.

With the evolution of electronic proposal submissions, the UND Research Development & Compliance Office has also taken on the responsibility of submitting those proposals electronically. So the standard submission process changes slightly in that once the RD&C Office has reviewed and signed your proposal, they will then submit this proposal electronically. After confirmation that the proposal has been submitted successfully, the RD&C Office will then contact the individual who is notated on the bottom of the SMHS Proposal Routing Form indicating that the proposal has been submitted and that it is ready to be picked up for your files.