Tips and Examples

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Examples of Successful Proposals

Fiber Optic Seismology for Earthquake Hazards Research, Monitoring and Early Warning, Powell Center Working Group Proposal, 2022

Status of butterflies in the United States, Powell Center Working Group Proposal, 2021

Proposal tips

To help Working Groups develop successful proposals, the Powell Center Science Advisory Board has adopted the following NCEAS rules of thumb to guide proposal preparation:

• Proposals are evaluated primarily on the significance and novelty of the idea(s) under consideration and should be question-driven (i.e., not purely descriptive).
• Provide a clear rationale for why the proposed activities should be, or can only be, done at the Powell Center with or without potential NSF co-funding.
• Be clear and concise. Provide brief examples of major points being made or approaches being used. “Trust me” proposals are not effective.
• Your reviewers are not always subject matter experts. Minimize technical jargon and unidentified acronyms.
• For each participant, specify the expertise brought to the project and whether he/she has agreed to participate.
• Indicate sources and attributes of data used in the project and their availability.
• If the results are designed or imagined to be useful to resource managers, make clear, valid statements about why and how that is so.

Most working group participants recognize the challenge of maintaining clear channels of communication among team members, so Powell Center collaborators are encouraged to discuss authorship and data sharing early and often. Publications resulting from Powell Center activities are authored by groups of researchers representing scientific fields with varied views on authorship and data sharing. 

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