NSF Grant Writing Notes

When writing an NSF Grant:

• Speak to the NSF Program Manager in advance if possible.
• Look at other grants that have been funded by the program.

• Letters of collaboration (not letters of support) are helpful. A letter of support is ignored by NSF; these are the letters that say "we encourage NSF to fund this project." It's not the role of an outside third party to tell NSF what to do. Only Congress can do that. But what NSF does pay attention to are letters of collaboration --- letters that say "we will work with the PIs to do this if they are funded." The letters should be offers of specific actions or items, rather than just overall "we will work with them" letters of good feelings.