Stronger Together 2010 Update

Mark Petersen offers these comments on the Stronger Together project:

Last night at midnight, the application window for ST2010 closed.   Here’s some stats:

• We received 131 applications.
• The total amount requested in the 131 applications was $3,619,268.
• The average ask was $27,628.   Very high for a permitted range of $5,000 – $30,000.

Now let’s do the math.  The eight partners have pledged up to $1,025,000 for qualifying initiatives.  If you divide this by the average grant request, this gives you an average total of 37 applications which will be approved.  We have committed to bring 125% of this amount to the granting partners for consideration — therefore, only ~45 will move on to the second round of consideration.  If the ask amounts were lower, we could have brought more forward to the partnership.  But as it stands, we will have to decline 86 at this early stage — in other words, 2 of 3 applications will be turned down outright.This is sad but true.   Weak applications, or ones that don’t adequately address the Stronger Together criteria won’t make the cut.It surprised us that a full 85% of applications were received by ST2010 in the last week, with 40% of the total arriving in the last two days (Saturday, Sunday) before the application window closed.  They were even arriving during the hockey game and up to midnight.  (I had a very bleary-eyed staff this morning.)

I am neck deep in the applications myself with a deadline for initial processing at the end of the week and I'm on a plane Thursday for a few days in the US. I'll try to resist too much Olympic gloating.