Yes. The State strongly encourages applicants who are denied in one cycle to request feedback, and then submit a revised proposal at a later cycle date. There will be no disadvantage to applying in a later cycle (unless there is no meaningful change to the grant application or project being proposed).
These are one-time grants.
We don’t believe that it would be reasonable to require an external evaluation for grants of $1 million or less, so none of our Student Success grants require it. What the State wants to know, though, is that the program team has built data collection, analysis, reflection, and learning into the program design. The State prepared a short guide to what should be included in an evaluation plan, which can be found here. The evaluation plan should be designed at an appropriate scale for the project being proposed.
Yes, a budget template is included in the application materials for each grant.
It’s correct that some of the funding will come from federal covid recovery fund sources, but these dollars are considered revenue replacement dollars, which are treated like state funds. Receipt of these funds, at any amount, does not create a subrecipient relationship or trigger a single audit requirement. Funds do not need to be included on the Schedule of Expenditures of Federal Awards (SEFA).
Reporting will be required quarterly and at the end of the project for Quick Start grants, and twice annually and at the end of the project for all other grants. Reporting requirements will be different for each grant and will reflect the evaluation plans, milestones, and metrics that were submitted as part of the awarded proposal and that the college plans to utilize as part of its own learning and evaluation. This will be developed as the grant agreement is finalized after the award but largely based on the information in the proposal.
The Office of Sixty by 30 is releasing a word document for each application type so that applicants can work on drafting and collaborating on an application with easy access to the questions. The actual application must be submitted through the EGrAMS portal, which will be opened at least two weeks prior to the application deadline. Reporting will also be done through the portal.
Each grant category has a maximum timeframe described in the application. Applications should include milestones for when they can realistically kick off, assuming that award determinations are made one to two months after the application deadline and grant agreements are signed an additional month later.
Yes. For the larger grants (Barrier Removal—Building Institutional Capacity, and College Success Accelerate and Go Big grants) there will be a prereview period prior to the application where applicants can get feedback on their proposals. The dates of the prereview and instructions for how to take advantage of prereview are included online and in the application materials.
In addition, applicants are encouraged to join office hours (which are posted weekly on the grants webpage) to share an outline of what they are planning and get informal sign-off that the application meets the minimum eligibility requirements.
A review team composed of staff from the Office of Sixty by 30 and subject matter experts from outside of Michigan will use a rubric aligned to the evaluation criteria to evaluate the applications. Institutions may receive additional questions. For those seeking Barrier Removal—Growing Institutional Capacity or College Succes (Amplify, Accelerate, or Go Big) grants, an interview may be required.
The Sixty by 30 team holds weekly office hours and ask that you join office hours to have your questions answered whenever possible. An updated zoom link is always available on our site (scroll to “Support Office Hours”).
