Through the university's Business Fellows initiative, Honors College assistant professor Barb Stedman is mentoring 10 students as they research potential funding organizations, collect data and write grant proposals for local community partners.

The project, "Profiting Nonprofits through Grantsmanship" allows students to work directly with nonprofits to seek additional funding by initiating the grant process, she said.

"These organizations face challenges in the area of grant writing, which will be critical to the long-term survival of many area nonprofits in the coming years," said Stedman, who teaches and provides administrative support within Ball State's Honors College. "Most don't have a paid staff and have only a limited pool of volunteers. They often struggle to fund programming and projects through limited donations. As a result, many projects are underfunded or behind in completion.

"Since these organizations lack the resources and personnel to write grant proposals, our job is to do the legwork to get the process started and, in some cases, actually craft a grant application," she said. "Our students are working in pairs, producing an entire grant proposal.

The nonprofit community partners and the projects include:

• Robert Cooper Audubon Society Inc., based in Muncie and serving Blackford, Delaware, Grant, Henry, Jay, Madison and Randolph counties, is seeking funding for a weekend workshop devoted to alternative energy sources and sustainable living.
• Friends of the Limberlost and its sister organization, Limberlost Swamp Remembered, based in Geneva, are seeking funding to restore part of what was once 13,000 acres of wetlands in Jay and Adams counties, known as the Limberlost.
• Wildlife Resqu House, based in Yorktown and founded in 1964 by Diana Shaffer, is one of the nation's oldest wildlife rehabilitation centers. Funding is being sought for daily operations, which includes aiding 400 to 600 animals each year as well as presenting educational programs.
• Cope Environmental Center, Centerville, promotes the sustainable use of the Earth's resources through education, demonstration and research. The organization is seeking funding to update and expand programming and facilities for education.
• AWAKEN Inc. (Afghan Women's and Kids' Education and Necessities), is based in Yorktown and run by Bibi Bahrami, who was a refugee during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. The organization is seeking funding to continue projects in Afghanistan, including a school opened in 2004, a vocational training center and a planned medical clinic for women and children.
   

"In many of the projects, the majority of the work this semester is going to be finding background information and data required to write a grant proposal," Stedman said. "I believe it is important that students spend time working in the nonprofit sector. It gives them a better understanding of what these small organizations go through on a daily basis. And, at the same time, it might lead them to think about working for a nonprofit that serves a community."

About Business Fellows and Building Better Communities

Business Fellows, coordinated by Ball State's Career Center and funded by a $1.5 million grant from Lilly Endowment Inc., gives Ball State students the opportunity to turn academic knowledge into business solutions through intense, semester-long applied work experiences that will benefit an Indiana business, industry or organization. The program works in concert with Ball State's Building Better Communities initiative.

Building Better Communities is a university-wide initiative designed to spur economic development and quality-of-life advancement in Indiana by extending Ball State's strengths in applied research and hands-on learning to community projects across the state. Building Better Communities works to match the university's expertise and resources to the varied needs of Indiana communities.

(Note to editors: For more information, contact Stedman at bstedman@bsu.edu or (765) 285-5086.)