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Development grants are available to help teams prepare their final entries to the IDEAS competition. The Frequently Asked Questions list below provides information about development grants.
About the award
What is a development grant?
What is the typical amount of the award?
Which types of items can be funded by a development grant?
Applying
What is the application process?
Can I see an example of a development grant request?
If our grant request was not approved, are there other sources of funding you can recommend?
Reimbursement and reporting
How can we be reimbursed after receiving the grant?
What procedure should we follow if we received a grant, but will not submit a final IDEAS entry in the competition?
What is a development grant?
A development grant is a grant awarded to an IDEAS team, in advance of the IDEAS final judging session, to help the team develop its project. Grant requests can be submitted on the 15th of every month from October to March, and they are submitted along with an initial proposal describing the project. Within two weeks, the team will meet the staff for a proposal review session and will be given a response to the grant request. If the grant is awarded, the team has three months to spend it.
The purpose of a development grant is to help a team prepare its entry to the IDEAS competition. Therefore, the grant cannot be used for certain items that might be useful to a team but that have a longer-term purpose. The guidelines for which expenses can and cannot be funded are described below.
What is the typical amount of the award?
Usually, development grants are in the range of $50 to several hundred dollars, though requests for more or less will be considered.
Which types of items can be funded by a development grant?
Grants are intended to help a team prepare its final entry to the IDEAS competition. Therefore, only expenses that are necessary in advance of the judging round and final proposal submission can be funded. Some examples include:
- materials for a prototype
- a visit to meet a community partner, to build a relationship and/or gather initial data
- safety equipment
- photocopies
- long distance phone calls
Because this grant is meant to prepare a team’s entry to the IDEAS competition, expenses that are related to implementation, or that have a longer-term purpose, cannot be funded. Some examples are:
- intellectual property, legal services
- professional quality marketing materials (e.g. mockups, brochures)
- a late-stage prototype or device, beyond what is necessary for IDEAS judging
- the costs of setting up manufacturing or distribution
- visits to a community partner that are for “implementation” purposes rather than building a relationship or gathering initial data
Team members cannot pay themselves for services.
When a specialized skill is needed (computer programming, graphic design, engineering, etc.), teams are encouraged to find someone in the MIT community or outside of MIT who will join the team, either as a member or an advisor. In some cases, development funds may be used to hire a professional to do short-term work that is beyond the team's capacity and not readily available by adding team members.
What is the application process?
Development grant requests are submitted in conjunction with IDEAS initial proposals at this link.
Proposals and grant requests can be submitted on the 15th of each month from October through March.
The IDEAS staff will review all proposals and grant requests and will meet with teams for a proposals review session within two weeks of submission. Response to the grant request will be given at that time.
Can I see an example of a development grant request?
This is a sample request that is compiled from several teams’ real development grant requests:
Overview of the development grant request
Team India-water is requesting development funds for two portions of our project. First, we would like to visit our community partner in Kerala and Karnataka, India, over IAP. This trip would allow us to meet the local Clean Water NGO workers as well as residents who could potentially use our device. We will also distribute surveys to potential users to help design our prototype and create a distribution plan. Arash, a team member in Bangalore, speaks the local language and will be taking the trip in January.
Second, we would like to continue building a prototype that can demonstrate proof-of-concept of our device during the IDEAS judging round. We are requesting funding for prototype building materials, and two for hours of services from an auto mechanic with safety expertise who will help install the heating device into a truck engine. We are also requesting funds to travel to New York to visit the local branch of the Clean Water NGO, where we will meet local users and obtain quality feedback about our prototype and design. The prototype building will occur during January-March and team member Sue will visit the New York site in mid-February.
1. Phone calls
Total amount requested |
Price per minute |
Total talk time |
Purpose of phone call(s) |
$150 |
About 30 cents |
7.5 hours |
For making International calls over the three months to establish contacts with Indian NGOs (e.g. Prajnopaya & Seva Mandir) & for supplementing intra-team e-mails with phone time during periods when one or more team member is away in India.
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2. Travel expenses
Total amount requested |
Destination(s) and ticket price(s) for each leg of travel |
Traveler(s) |
Purpose of trip and reason for each traveler to attend |
$300 |
Train travel within India, four one-way trips. Price estimate is based on one-way between Bangalore and Kerala, $66. |
Arash Patel |
Based on our talks with the Clean Water NGO organization, this will be used to visit clinics in Karnataka & Kerala. Our overseas team member Arash is a student at the University of Bangalore and will be traveling to the camps to collect survey data that we will use to develop our prototype. |
$40 |
Bus travel to New York City ($20 each way) |
Sue McGillicuddy |
Sue would like to travel to New York City to the offices of the Clean Water NGO, where he has arranged interviews with previous users and will collect video footage of them interacting with our device. |
3. Other items
Total amount requested |
Item
|
Vendor |
Unit price (per item, per hour, etc.) and shipping |
Purpose |
$42.34 |
Plastic tubing |
McMaster Carr, Item 887342 |
$39.99 each plus $2.35 shipping |
This tubing will be used to build our prototype (see diagram in initial proposal). |
$120 |
Two hours of installation help from Pat T. Mechanic |
Auto City Mechanics, Brookline |
$60/hour |
Pat T. Mechanic will help us install the heating component of our device on a truck engine. None of our team members has the specialized expertise in truck engines; Pat’s help will be necessary to make sure the device works and will eventually be useful for creating an installation manual. |
$10 |
Printing |
MIT Copytech |
To be determined by the number of survey pages |
Printing of surveys that Sue will distribute to patients at the community partner site. |
Total funds requested: $502.34
If our grant request was not approved, are there other sources of funding you can recommend?
If your team wins the competition, the IDEAS award can be spent on items that the development grant is not eligible for (implementation, advanced prototypes, legal services, etc.).
Some other funding sources are also listed on the Resources page.
At the proposal review session following your grant application, the IDEAS staff can help answer your questions about where to obtain funding or other resources.
How can we be reimbursed after receiving the grant?
Bring receipts to the Public Service Center; they will be processed within a few weeks.
Teams that are awarded development grants before February will have three months in which to spend their grants, starting from the time of submitting their initial proposal and grant request. Any unspent development grant funds will then revert back to the IDEAS Competition. After the three month period, teams are eligible to submit new development grant requests (as long as they are accompanied by revised initial proposals). Teams that are awarded development grants from February through March will have until the IDEAS judging session in 2008 in which to spend their grants.
So, the earlier you submit your initial proposal and first grant request, the more feedback and development grants you will be eligible for!
Receipts must be saved in order to be reimbursed.
What if we receive a development grant but end up not submitting a final application?
If you receive a development grant, we require that you submit either an IDEAS final application or a report on your project.
We hope that a development grant will help you to create an impressive project, and that you will enter the IDEAS Competition.
If you receive a development grant but do not enter the Competition (for whatever reason), we require that you submit a brief report on your project and how you used your development grant.
- Team name
- List of team members with e-mail for each member
- Description of project (~500 words):
- What problem or challenge were you trying to address?
- What community were you trying to serve?
- What was innovative about your approach?
Discussion:
- What progress have you made since the grant was awarded?
- Why are you not pursuing the project through the IDEAS Competition?
- Do you have any plans for continuing with the project?
- What resources or support would you need to take your project forward at this time? Is there some way we can help
Development Grant report:
- Amount of Development Grant awarded
- Amount of Development Grant spent
- Itemized list of Development Grant expenses (including item, price, and reason for purchase)
- Tell us how useful you felt the development grant was to your team. Was it enough? Did you have enough time to make good use of it? Do you think your request was fairly judged?
- What other IDEAS resources did you take advantage of?
- Are there other resources or support mechanisms we could have provided that would have been useful to your team?
If you have other questions about the development grant process, please contact Samantha at ideas-admin@mit.edu
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