Pre-App Script - FINAL - 1.25.18.docx

FY 2018 Consolidated Grant Program to Address Children and Youth Experiencing Domestic and Sexual Assault and Engage Men and Boys as Allies Pre-Application Conference Call

Thursday, January 25, 2018 2:30 pm to 4:00 pm (EST)

WELCOME AND INTRODUCTIONS

Welcome to the Pre-Application Conference Call for the Fiscal Year 2018 Consolidated Grant Program to Address Children and Youth Experiencing Domestic and Sexual Assault and Engage Men and Boys as Allies (also referred to as the “Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men Program”) solicitation.

To limit disruptions and ensure everyone is able to hear the discussion, please mute your phones. You may mute your phone by hitting *6 or using your phone’s mute button. In addition, please do not place the call on hold. If your office telephone system plays music for callers who are on hold, the music from these systems is loud and disruptive and makes it impossible for others to hear what is being said. If you need to answer another line, hang up and then call back into the conference line. Thank you in advance for your cooperation and thank you for your interest in the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men Program.

The Office on Violence Against Women (also referred to as “OVW”) is convening this pre-application conference call to go over the FY 2018 solicitation for the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men Grant Program. I am Kellie Greene. I am the Program Specialist assigned to the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men Program. The purpose of this conference call is to provide information regarding the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men solicitation. I will cover highlights of the solicitation in today’s call, however it is not the intent, nor is there sufficient time, to go over every aspect of the solicitation. All applicants are responsible for reading the solicitation and reviewing the contents of all application materials and ensuring that a complete application is submitted.

OVW staff cannot provide feedback to applicants about the quality of an applicant’s proposal or provide information outside of that presented in the solicitation. For the call today, I ask that you hold your questions. If there is time remaining at the end of this presentation I will respond to questions.

Let’s get started…..If you have the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men solicitation in front of you, today’s call will follow the order of topics as listed in the solicitation.

ELIGIBILITY

Eligibility is mentioned on the cover of the solicitation, as well as on pages 10 and 11. Eligible applicants are nonprofits, nongovernmental entities, Indian tribes, tribal nonprofit organizations, units of local government, and agencies of a unit of local government. I will go over these more in depth later in this call.

Both new and continuation applications are being accepted. Grantees that were awarded a Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men grant in FY 2016 or FY 2017 are not eligible to apply for funding in FY 2018.

DEADLINES

On page ii of the solicitation please note that applications are due by 11:59 pm Eastern Time on Thursday, February 15, 2018. Applicants are strongly encouraged to read pages 27 through 30 so that you are fully aware of the submission date and time, the submission process, and OVW’s policy on late submissions.

REGISTRATION

You will also note on page ii of the solicitation that you must “register” by January 31, 2018. Registration includes several steps and is not something that can be completed quickly. In fact, it can take several days to complete the registration process, which includes: 1) obtaining a Data Universal Number System (DUNS) number; 2) ensuring that you register with the System for Award Management (SAM); and 3) registering online with SAM and Grants.gov. The registration process must be completed before applicants may submit an application so I strongly encourage you to begin this process sooner rather than later.

Each year there are applications that are rejected during the submission process because their DUNS number and/or registration with SAM have expired. At the end of the call today, I suggest that you start this process if you have not already done so. I also recommend that you check to ensure that your DUNS number and SAM registration have not expired.

You can find more information related to Registration on pages 26 and 27 of the solicitation.

SUBMISSION AND NOTIFICATION INFORMATION

On page iii of the solicitation, you will notice that all applications for the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men program are submitted through Grants.gov. If you have questions specific to the registration or submission process through Grants.Gov, please contact grants.gov customer support at 1-800-518-4726.

OVW anticipates notifying all applicants of funding decisions by October 1, 2018.

You will find additional information related to the submission process on pages 27 to 30, which I strongly encourage you to review.

SECTION A: PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

Page 1 of the solicitation provides background on the history and goals for the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men Program. As mentioned in the solicitation, this program is authorized by the FY 2012 through FY 2017 federal appropriation acts, which consolidated four previously authorized and appropriated programs into one comprehensive program. The four programs are listed on the bottom of page 1.

Through the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men Program, communities have the opportunity to create, enhance, or expand a Coordinated Community Response (otherwise known as CCR) to increase collaboration and partnerships among non-profit victim service providers, community service organizations including those focused on engaging men as allies, schools, tribes and tribal governments, and local government agencies and programs to address a comprehensive approach to prevention and intervention for youth impacted by sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, stalking, and sex trafficking.

Purpose Areas This grant program supports two types of community-based projects: Comprehensive projects and Engaging Men projects. Comprehensive projects are focused on a comprehensive approach to addressing youth impacted by sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, stalking, or sex trafficking. This is accomplished through a CCR approach that is inclusive of prevention, intervention, response, and treatment strategies for children, youth, and young adults who are victims of or exposed to the VAWA crimes just mentioned, including support for non-abusing parents and caretakers.

Engaging Men projects are focused on strategies and activities that develop positive adult male leaders and role models as a way to mobilize men in the community as allies in the prevention of violence against women and girls.

Engaging Men work is more than just providing a one-off prevention education presentation to young boys and men. That is why we have separated the Engaging Men projects from the Comprehensive projects. Comprehensive projects that wish to include engaging men and boys activities in their project should include it as part of their prevention strategies.

Please note that applicants are limited to applying for only one project type, either Comprehensive or Engaging Men, not both. Applicants that submit applications for both project types risk the elimination of one or both applications from further review. Last year several applications were eliminated because they did not follow this stipulation. Please be sure you are submitting an application that is only for one project type.

Mandatory Program Requirements On pages 2 to 5 of the solicitation, you will find information related to the mandatory program requirements. Applicants that receive funding under the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men program are required to engage in certain activities throughout the award period. The first is a Coordinated Community Response (or CCR), which I have previously mentioned. Grantees of both Comprehensive projects and Engaging Men projects must create a multi-disciplinary team to develop and guide the proposed project. The CCR must meet regularly and be representative of the community to be served with grant funds.

The second program requirement is that all applicants must identify at least one marginalized or underserved population to be served by the project. For purposes of this grant program, children and youth are not considered an underserved or marginalized population.

Third, all grantees are required to attend a mandatory New Grantee Orientation. Fourth, grantees must complete a six month planning phase at the beginning of the award period in which grantees are required to conduct a community needs assessment and develop a strategic plan for implementing the project. And last, all grantees must participate in the technical assistance events and activities that are organized and supported by the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men program designated technical assistance providers. This includes monthly and/or quarterly conference and telephone calls, site visits, in-person training institutes, and web-based trainings.

Besides the mandatory requirements that I have just covered, each project type has additional mandatory requirements that must be included in your proposed project, which can be found on pages 3 to 4 of the solicitation. Let us first review the additional mandatory requirements for Comprehensive projects. Applicants choosing to submit applications for a Comprehensive project must address all aspects of children, youth, and/or young adult’s exposure to sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, stalking, or sex trafficking across the developmental spectrum ranging from ages 0 through 24 (depending on the target population); and the continuum of proposed prevention, intervention, treatment, and response. Page 3 lists the required activities that must be included in your proposed project. It is important to note that intervention, treatment, and response activities must include all of the following: direct victim services; counseling; training for individuals who work with children; a CCR; and the development or revision of policies that address confidentiality, information sharing, parental consent, mandatory reporting, safety and security of children, youth, young adults, and non-abusing parents or caretakers, and background checks for adults working with minors or vulnerable populations.

Page 4 lists the mandatory requirements specific to Engaging Men projects. It is important to note that applicants submitting an application for an Engaging Men project must include all of the following: incorporation of men’s organizations and/or programs in all project activities; a selection process to identify men who will serve as Engaging Men leaders; development of a curriculum for training the male leaders on the VAWA crimes; provision of crisis intervention by a trained victim advocate or mental health counselor at all public events and/or project activities that directly engage or involve children, youth, or young adults; and development or revision of policies that address confidentiality, information sharing, parental consent, and mandatory reporting, and background checks for adults working with minors or vulnerable populations.

As I have mentioned previously, I strongly encourage you to read the solicitation to ensure you are meeting all of the mandatory requirements for your proposed project.

OVW Priority Areas Information regarding the five OVW Priority Areas for the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men Program can be found on pages 5 and 6. Applications proposing projects to address these Priority Areas will be given special consideration during the review process. Please note that applicants do not have to address these priority areas. It is optional. However, if you do choose to include one or more of the priority areas in your project, please be certain that your project narrative and budget include activities and strategies to address the specific priority area adequately. I am going to quickly review each priority area and again strongly encourage you to refer to the solicitation for the full explanation and requirements of each priority area.

1. Improve services for and/or the response to victims of sex trafficking and other severe forms of trafficking in persons who have also experienced domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, or stalking.

Comprehensive projects choosing to address this priority area should provide a full spectrum of strategies that include intervention and treatment, and the response of the criminal justice system (law enforcement, courts, corrections, etc.) to address the needs of youth sex trafficking victims.

Applicants proposing to address this priority area must demonstrate capacity to serve this population, either through their own expertise and experience or through partnerships with organizations and/or agencies that have such expertise and experience. In addition, applicants must partner with federal, state, and/or local law enforcement, prosecution, and the local child advocacy center and this must be included in the MOU.

2. Increase support for survivors of sexual assault, including services, law enforcement response, and prosecution.

3. Meaningfully increase access to OVW programming for specific marginalized and/or underserved populations (based on race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, age, etc.).

4. Increase the use of promising, evidence-based, and evidence-building practices, where available.

Applicants who choose to address this priority area must select a model and/or practice listed on the Effective and Promising Practice Programs section of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) website and describe how the selected model will assist the applicant in meeting the needs of children and youth.

5. Increase the capacity of girls to be leaders and influencers in combating violence against women and girls.

OVW encourages Comprehensive applicants to submit projects that develop or expand programs and/or campaigns that specifically provide tools, resources, and training to empower girls to be social influencers, positive role models, and leaders as part of their proposed prevention, intervention, and response strategies.

It is important to note that not all of the priority areas are relevant to both project types. Applicants choosing to address a priority area should be certain that it fits the proposed project type and is an allowable activity for that specific project within the program. For example, priority area 5, increasing the capacity of girls to be leaders and influencers, does not fit within the scope of an Engaging Men project.

Activities that Compromise Victim Safety, Out-of-Scope Activities, and Unallowable Activities Pages 6 to 8 address activities that compromise victim safety, out-of-scope activities, and unallowable activities. As in previous sections, I am not going to go through these one-by-one; instead, I am going to highlight the ones that are often missed in applications and the ones that are new to the solicitation this year.

You will find a list on pages 6 and 7 of the activities that compromise victim safety. Please review these prior to writing your application to ensure you do not include any of the listed activities in your project. To assist you with submitting a strong application I am going to go over some of the ones that have caused applicants to receive point deductions during peer review.

# 4 – Procedures or policies that fail to include conducting safety planning with victims. It is not enough to say that you will conduct safety planning with victims. A strong application will provide details of how safety planning is incorporated into procedures and policies; how safety planning is conducted with victims; what is discussed during the safety planning process; and the purpose of the safety planning.

# 5 – Project designs and budgets that fail to account for the access needs of individuals with disabilities, with limited English proficiency, or who are Deaf or hard of hearing. Peer reviewers usually deduct points off of the project narrative and the budget for applications that do not include information and/or designated funding for how applicants will make their services and/or products accessible to individuals with disabilities. Please give this serious consideration when completing your application.

# 11 – Failing to develop policies regarding confidentiality, parental involvement/consent, mandatory reporting, and working with other ancillary service providers. This is another one that peer reviewers routinely deduct points for during the peer review process. Having these policies in place not only protects the safety of the victim, but also enhances the working relationship between service providers, and increases delivery of services to victims. Do not assume that peer reviewers will know that these policies exist because you are a victim service provider. They are looking for proof that they do exist or will be developed and the only way for them to know this is if they read it in your project narrative.

Pages 7 and 8 list the of out-of-scope activities. Again, please review these prior to writing your application to ensure you do not include any of the listed activities in your project. To assist you with submitting a strong application I am going to go over some of the ones that have caused applicants to receive point deductions during the peer review process.

# 6 – Sexual Harassment: Grant funds may not be used to develop training, products, or policies on sexual harassment. While sexual harassment can be a traumatic experience, it is not one of the crimes listed in the violence against women act (VAWA) that OVW is able to address with grant funds. Please refrain from including activities and/or strategies that address sexual harassment in your project narrative to avoid possible point deductions.

# 7 – Bullying and Hazing: Grant funds may not be used to develop training, products, or policies on bullying and/or hazing. OVW recognizes that children and youth experience bullying and/or hazing. OVW also appreciates that applicants would like to take a comprehensive approach when addressing youth impacted by violence. However, as is the case with sexual harassment, bullying and hazing are not included in the VAWA crimes. Please avoid including activities and/or strategies that address bullying and/or hazing in your projects.

# 12 – Eligible Service Area: Grant funds may not be used to conduct or support regional or statewide projects. All applicants must ensure that proposed projects support community-specific activities and strategies only. In the past there have been applications removed for further review because the proposed project was a statewide initiative. To avoid having this happen to your application, please ensure that your project is focused to a specific community.

Page 8 lists the unallowable activities. Please review these prior to writing your application to ensure you do not include any of the listed activities in your project. There are two newly listed activities for this year.

# 6 – Purchasing and/or leasing of vehicles.

# 7 – Entertainment, such as tickets to movies or sporting events.

To wrap up this section, as I have said in previous sections, I strongly urge you to review, carefully, the information I have just discussed. I have seen applications miss the funding cut-off score by just one point because one of these activities was included in the application. Please do not be that application!

SECTION B: FEDERAL AWARD INFORMATION

For those of you following along with the solicitation, we are now on page 9.

Award Period The grant award period is for 36 months, tentatively beginning on October 1, 2018 and ending on September 30, 2021. Applicants should submit applications with project activities and budgets that reflect this period.

Award Amounts Please read the information in the solicitation on page 9 to understand the award amounts available for the two types of projects funded through this program. Applicants applying for a Comprehensive project may request up to $750,000. Applicants proposing an Engaging Men project may request up to $350,000. Remember, you may only select one type of project. Applicants that apply for both may be eliminated from further consideration.

Additionally, like last year, OVW will be prioritizing Engaging Men projects. OVW will allocate at least one quarter of the appropriated funds for this specific program to support viable Engaging Men projects. The purpose of this is to ensure equitable distribution of funding to support both project types within the Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men Program.

SECTION C: ELIGIBILITY INFORMATION

Pages 10 and 11 of the solicitation lists the eligible applicants and requirements for each project type. Please review this information carefully as there have been changes to this section from last year’s solicitation. Applications that are submitted by ineligible entities or that do not meet the program requirements will be eliminated from the review process.

Let’s talk about Comprehensive projects first.

There are four types of entities that may submit an application for Comprehensive projects. The first is nonprofits or nongovernmental organizations. These entities must meet one of the two listed requirements on page 10. They must provide direct services to children and youth who have been victims of and/or exposed to sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, stalking, or sex trafficking. Or, they must serve adult victims of the crimes I just listed, and also have a designated program within their organization that provides comprehensive services to children and youth who are victims of and/or exposed to the crimes listed.

The second and third type of entity that may submit an application are Indian tribes and tribal nonprofit organizations. The requirement for tribal entities is that they must provide services to children or youth who are victims of and/or exposed to the previously mentioned crimes.

The fourth type of entity that may submit an application is a unit of local government or an agency of a unit of local government. Some examples of this type of entity are a city or county health department; a prosecutor’s office and/or a victim witness program within a prosecutor’s office; and the department of parks and recreation or the department of children and families within the city or county government.

Let’s move on to the requirements for Engaging Men projects.

For applicants proposing an Engaging Men project there are also four types of entities that may submit an application. They are the same as Comprehensive projects, however, the requirements for nonprofits and nongovernmental organizations is different. Nonprofits and nongovernmental agencies wishing to submit an application must meet one of the two requirements listed on page 10. Specifically, a nonprofit or nongovernment agency must have a history of developing public education and/or community-based campaigns focused on engaging men as allies to prevent violence against women and girls. Or, have a history of engagement with men and boys with the intent of developing them into community leaders, role models, and social influencers for youth and/or other men. Please note that for this requirement it is not necessary that the history be specific to the VAWA crimes; it is specific to the development of men and boys as community leaders.

Before moving to the next section, I want to reiterate, once again, the importance of reading the solicitation. Pay close attention to the requirements as listed on pages 10 and 11, especially where you have the option of meeting only one of the two listed requirements or requirements that contain two elements that must be met. For example, if you are a nonprofit agency submitting a Comprehensive project and you state that your agency primarily serves adult victims of the VAWA crimes, you must also have a designated program within your agency that serves children and youth. It will be important for applicants to articulate this in the application so that it is clear that a program exists within your agency that provides comprehensive direct services to youth impacted by sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, stalking, or sex trafficking.

Last, schools and school districts, including colleges and universities are not eligible to submit an application; however, they are a required partner for Comprehensive projects. Engaging Men projects may choose to partner with a school, but it is not a requirement.

Delivery of Legal Assistance Pages 11 and 12 discuss the requirements that must be met for applicants that wish to include legal assistance activities within Comprehensive projects. I am not going to go over this section in detail as you can refer to the solicitation to determine what is necessary to meet the requirements if you choose to incorporate this service into your project. For those applicants that wish to provide legal assistance, please note that no more than 10% of your total budget may be used for this purpose. In addition, you must certify in writing that you meet or will meet certain requirements if awarded funding. The instructions on how to do this can be found on page 12 of the solicitation.

Required Partnerships Next, I am going to discuss the required partnerships for both types of projects. This requirement has changed significantly from last year. I cannot stress strong enough how important it is for you to thoroughly read the information that is provided on pages 12 through 14. Applicants that fail to meet the partnership requirements will be removed from the review process.

Each project type has different partnership requirements, however, what is the same for both, and what is a change from last year’s solicitation, is that the applicant and partner organizations cannot fulfill multiple requirements or roles. Applicants and partners are limited to meeting only one partnership category or role. Let me repeat that because it is important. Applicants and partners are limited to serving as the agency or organization to meet the partnership requirement in only one category or role.

I am going to start with the partnership requirements for Comprehensive projects. Applicants submitting an application for a Comprehensive project must have a minimum of three partners for a total of at least four entities working together to meet the goals and objectives of the proposed project. The required partners are: a school or school district; a domestic violence and/or sexual assault service provider; a children- and youth-focused community-based program or organization; and a community-based culturally specific or population-specific agency or organization.

I am not going to take a deep dive into each of the required partners or the partnership requirements. However, there are a few key points I want to stress about the partnerships. First, other than the domestic violence and/or sexual assault service provider, it is not a requirement of this program that the partners have experience or expertise in working with children and youth who have been victims of the VAWA crimes. Each of the required partners should bring the specific skills and knowledge necessary to support the overall successful development and implementation of the proposed project. When determining who to partner with to meet each of the roles and categories you should take into consideration the identified marginalized and/or underserved population(s) and age range of the children and youth that will be served through the proposed project. For example, ABC Sexual Assault Center is submitting an application that proposes to focus on serving homeless and runway youth ages 13 to 18 who also identify as LGBT. Their required partners for the project are going to be Middleburg Middle and High School; Building Hope, a community-based organization that provides housing and support services and resources to homeless and runaway youth; and Living Today, a community-based organization that serves and represents the local LGBT community. The two community-based organizations are not victim service providers, but they possess the expertise necessary in understanding and meeting the needs of homeless youth and youth who identify as LGBT.

In addition, applicants who are submitting proposals for Comprehensive projects and choose to address OVW priority area #1, Trafficking, are required to have additional partners, which are: a local, state, and/or federal law enforcement agency; a local, state, and/or federal prosecutor’s office; and the local child advocacy center. Therefore, these particular projects will have six partners.

Next, I am going to discuss the partnership requirements for Engaging Men projects, which can be found on page 13 of the solicitation. Applicants proposing an engaging men project will have a minimum of two project partners for a total of at least three entities working together to meet the goals and objectives of the proposed project. The required partnerships for Engaging Men projects are: a domestic violence and/or sexual assault service provider; a community-based culturally specific or population-specific agency or organization; and a male, civic-minded organization or program.

I am not going to take a deep dive into each of the required partners or the partnership requirements. However, there are a few key points I want to stress about the partnerships. First, other than the domestic violence and/or sexual assault service provider, it is not a requirement of this program that the partners have experience or expertise in working with children and youth who have been victims. Each of the required partners should bring the specific skills and knowledge necessary to support the overall successful development and implementation of the proposed project. When determining who to partner with to meet each of the roles and categories you should take into consideration the identified marginalized and/or underserved population(s) and age range of the children and youth that will be served through the proposed project. For example, Sunshine Mentorships, an organization that runs a mentorship program for youth from single-parent homes is submitting an application that proposes to focus on serving the Cambodian population in their community. The required partners for the project are going to be the Cambodian Cultural Center, a community-based organization that is a resource for the Cambodian community; the Cambodia Christian Church, a local church that has a long-standing program that assists its male members in becoming positive leaders and role-models in the Cambodian community; and ABC Domestic and Sexual Violence Center, a victim service center that provides prevention, intervention, and response services to victims and the community. The applicant, community-based organization, and church are not victim service providers, but they possess the expertise necessary in understanding and meeting the needs of the Cambodian community. In this example, there are a total of three partners and the applicant, so when combined they meet all of the requirements of the partnership categories and roles.

As I have previously mentioned, I am not covering this section in detail. It is the responsibility of the applicant to review pages 12 through 14 to ensure their completed applications include the required partnerships and meet the respective partnership requirements associated with each project type. It is very important for applicants to be aware that in this year’s solicitation, applicants and partners may fulfill only one partnership category.

I want to spend just a moment discussing community-based culturally-specific or population-specific agencies or organizations. These organizations do not need to have a history or expertise in providing victim services or prevention programs on sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, stalking, or sex trafficking. The mission of these agencies or organizations should be to represent and/or serve the identified marginalized and/or underserved population(s) to be served through the proposed project activities and strategies. Some examples of these are agencies are LGBT centers, cultural centers for specific segments of the community such as African immigrants, or organizations that work with migrant farm workers. The purpose of entering into a partnership with these organizations is that these organizations are connected to the individuals that will be served through the proposed project.

Applicants for both project types are encouraged to partner with as many organizations and/or agencies to ensure their projects meet the diverse needs of their target population(s).

SECTION D: APPLICATION AND SUBMISSION INFORMATION

I am moving ahead to page 16. I am not going to touch on everything in this section; however, I will be covering some of the application requirements. I strongly encourage you to read pages 16 through 23 of the solicitation. The information on these pages will help you write a strong and responsive application.

Summary Data Sheet Every application must include a summary data sheet. This document is scored during the review process and should be no more than four pages. The best way to avoid having points deducted is to answer each of the 15 questions in the order that they are listed in the solicitation. Some applicants in the past have cut and pasted the questions into a new document and provided a response below each question. Other applicants have numbered the information being provided so that it is clear they are responding to a specific question. A note of caution, although questions five and six refer you to a table that is provided in the appendix of the solicitation, the tables that you will create if you have information that must be reported for these two questions must be within the four pages of the data summary sheet. They cannot be in addition to the four pages or submitted as Appendix D or Appendix E. Please read these two questions carefully. Question five is specifically asking for current or recent OVW grants and/or cooperative agreements. Question six is asking for other federal grants from which the applicant is currently receiving funding or has applied for funding in FY18 to do similar work to this program. Please do not list every federal grant that you currently have or have applied unless it is similar to this work.

All applications must include the following three components: a project narrative; a budget and budget narrative; and a memorandum of understanding. Applications that do not include these three components will be considered substantially incomplete and will not be considered for funding.

Project Narrative (70 points) The project narrative consists of three sections: purpose of application; what will be done; and who will implement. All combined, the project narrative is worth a total of 70 points and is the bulk of the application. This is where applicants provide detailed information related to the proposed project. Before I get into each section of the project narrative, it is important to discuss the page limit. It is imperative that you are mindful of the formatting (see page 15 for specifics) and the number of allowable pages. Peer reviewers are instructed to stop reading and scoring this section at the page number cut off. You do not want to lose valuable points due to going over the page limit. With that said, the project narrative for Comprehensive projects should be no more than 25 pages and no more than 20 pages for Engaging Men projects. I will say that one more time. The page limit for the project narrative for Comprehensive projects may not exceed 25 pages. The page limit for the project narrative for Engaging Men projects may not exceed 20 pages.

Purpose of the Application (20 points) This section describes the need for the project and helps reviewers understand your specific community needs. Common mistakes include providing too much information, information that is not relevant to the proposed project, or not enough information to be responsive to what is being asked. Follow the guidance on pages 17 and 18 of the solicitation to ensure you are providing the required information. Also, keep in mind that this section counts toward the page limit. You want to be sure that you are being responsive to the questions in this section while at the same time ensuring you have enough pages remaining to provide detailed information on the proposed project. I have seen applications where the applicant used more pages to describe the need for the project than the number of pages to describe the project activities to address the problem. Strong applications find the balance between justifying the need and providing detailed information on how the need will be addressed.

What Will Be Done (30 points) This is the section where you will describe what you are going to do with the grant funds. You should provide detailed information that clearly describes the activities and strategies to support your proposed project. The goals and objectives should be clear and detailed so that reviewers understand how the proposed activities will meet the needs identified and the program requirements listed. For example, there is a difference between stating, “We will conduct trainings for teachers” and “We will conduct annual training for all teachers on the dynamics of sexual assault and creating a trauma-informed school environment.”

Additionally, it is important to note that there are different requirements for Comprehensive projects and Engaging Men projects, so please be sure to follow the guidance provided on pages 18 and 19 of the solicitation to ensure you are being responsive to what is being asked.

Some common mistakes to avoid in this section are:

· Not providing a description of products to be developed or purchased with grant funds. If products such as brochures, videos, billboards, or curriculums are mentioned in this section, there should be a line item for them included in the budget, and vice versa.

· Not describing how products and/or services will be made accessible to individuals with disabilities, individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing, and persons with limited English proficiency.

· Not describing how products and/or services will be tailored to meet the needs of the specific marginalized and/or underserved population to be served.

· Not including activities and strategies that will be developed and implemented to meet the OVW priority areas that the applicant has chosen to address and identified on the summary data sheet.

· For Comprehensive projects, failing to address the full-spectrum of the program, which is inclusive of prevention, intervention, response, and treatment. Please refer to page 19 of the solicitation to ensure you are incorporating all of the requirements of the program into your proposed activities and strategies.

· For Engaging Men projects, failing to include information on how crisis intervention services will be made available to project participants during community events and project activities. Please refer to page 19 of the solicitation to ensure you are incorporating all of the requirements of the program into your proposed activities and strategies.

Who Will Implement the Project (20 points) In this section, the applicant should identify whom the key individuals and organizations will be that are involved in the proposed project. This section must demonstrate that the individuals and organizations identified have the capacity to address the stated need and can successfully implement the proposed project activities.

As a friendly reminder, this section is also part of the page limit. You will want to keep this section focused on who is involved in the major project activities and who is most responsible for ensuring the goals and objectives of the proposed project are met. Please refer to pages 19 and 20 to ensure you include all of the required information for this section.

Some common mistakes in this section are:

· Not providing a list of all key project personnel and not providing a description of their roles and responsibilities that are specific to the proposed project; and not including the percentage of time each individual will devote to the project.

· Failing to provide information related to an individual or organization’s capacity to serve the marginalized and/or underserved population listed on the summary data sheet.

· For Comprehensive projects, not addressing the provision of services for the nonabusing parent or caretaker.

Budget Detail Worksheet and Narrative (10 points) During the peer review process the peer review panels will be reviewing and scoring the budgets to ensure they meet the program requirements and do not include any unallowable activities and/or expenses. It is the applicant’s responsibility to read this section thoroughly in order to submit a proper budget. Pages 20 through 22 provide detailed information on how to develop and submit your budget for your proposed project. A sample budget and template is provided in Appendix A on pages 40 through 50.

To assist you with submitting a strong budget, please be mindful of the following. First, the award period for this grant program is 36 months: October 1, 2018 to September 30, 2021. The funding cap for Comprehensive projects is $750,000 and $350,000 for Engaging Men projects. While proposed budgets may be submitted for less than the respective project type cap, they cannot exceed these caps.

As mentioned previously, one of the most significant changes to the solicitation this year from year’s past is that applicants may only apply for one project type: Comprehensive or Engaging Men. Applicants that submit applications for both and/or combine the budget caps for each project may be eliminated from further review and without notice.

All applicants, regardless of project type, must include funds specifically for OVW mandated technical assistance and travel costs. The Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men program has a dedicated team of technical assistance providers specifically for the purpose of providing comprehensive technical assistance programming to grantees. All Consolidated Youth and Engaging Men grantees are required to attend and participate in the technical assistance events. Projects located in the contiguous US must allocate $50,000 and projects located in the US territories, Hawaii, or Alaska must allocate $55,000. This funding may not be used for other travel and/or training and any remaining funds in this section will be returned to OVW at the end of the award period. Applicants should plan to send at least four (4) individuals involved in their project to three (3) OVW mandated technical assistance training events each year of the award for a total of nine (9) training events. In addition to the training events, grantees are required to send a minimum of two individuals to the one-time New Grantee Orientation.

The budget should also include funds to ensure project activities and materials are accessible to individuals with disabilities. For example, videos could be close-caption and translated into other languages; written materials could be translated into different languages; interpreters could be made available at events and/or in the process of providing direct victim services for those who are deaf, hard of hearing, or speak a language other than English.

Next, the budget should include funds to compensate all project partners for their contribution to the project. The exception to this is if a project partner is a state, local, tribal, or territorial agency and the activities they would be responsible for in the project are within their regular scope of work. An example of this would be a victim-witness liaison in the prosecutor’s office who would be responsible for accompanying a victim to a court proceeding. Because this is within the normal scope of work of the victim-witness liaison and the prosecutor’s office, this grant could not compensate them for that activity. However, you could designate grant funds to compensate them for mileage to and from the Coordinated Community Response meetings, travel costs associated with attending the OVW mandated technical assistance trainings, and participating in after-hour community events.

In some circumstances, the budget is reviewed independently of the full application. Therefore, it is important that the budget narrative be as comprehensive as possible and describe in detail each line item in the budget. A strong budget and budget narrative should provide enough information to understand the proposed project without having to refer back to the project narrative. In addition to the guidance that is provided on pages 20 to 22 of the solicitation, I strongly encourage you to review the sample budget that is provided in Appendix A on pages 40 to 50 of the solicitation. The template that is provided is an excellent example of the format in which to create your budget and budget narrative.

Lastly, a friendly word of advice, and one that our reviewers will appreciate that you heed. Please do not use anything less than 12-point font when developing your budget. Reviewers are looking over numerous budgets. It is very hard and frustrating to read a budget that is 10 point font or smaller. There is no page limit for the budget section, so there is no need to try to squeeze it onto two or three pages. In addition, the budget should be one document that is inclusive of all three years. Please do not submit three one-year budgets. Again, my best advice is to follow the sample budget in Appendix A.

Now I’d like to introduce a colleague of mine. Suheyla Laskey is a Financial Analyst in the Grants Financial Management Division (also known as GFMD) in OVW. She is going to provide you with additional information on the financial requirements of the solicitation.

Thank you, Suheyla.

Okay, we are almost done!

Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) (15 points) Pages 22 and 23 provide detailed information on what is required to be included in the MOU. I encourage you to review this carefully when creating your MOU to ensure you are meeting all of the requirements. In the past, I have seen applications miss the cut-off score by a point because information was missing from the MOU.

I am not going to go over everything that must be included in the MOU; instead, I am going to provide you with some examples of common mistakes and some helpful hints.

Common mistakes that result in point deductions and/or removal from review:

· Submitting multiple MOUs. The MOU for this program should be one document. You can have multiple signature pages so long as all of the names and titles of everyone signing the MOU are included.

· Not addressing each of the requirements in the MOU. There is no page limit for the MOU, so there is no excuse for not being responsive to the requirements listed on page 22.

· Missing signatures, especially the signatures of the required partners. Every person and/or organization listed in the MOU must sign the MOU.

· Submitting an outdated or irrelevant MOU. The MOU must be current and must responsive to the solicitation requirements. In almost every circumstance, the MOU will be a new document that is drafted specifically for the proposed project.

I am almost done. Stay with me for just a few more minutes and then we can get to your questions.

As I have mentioned previously, it is the applicant’s responsibility to read the solicitation in its entirety. Everything that needs to be included in or with your application is mentioned in the solicitation. I have not reviewed every section of the solicitation so, please, please, please, read the solicitation.

To close out the call, I have some tips that may improve your chances on becoming a Comprehensive and Engaging Men grant recipient. Please note that the following list is not a guarantee that you will be funded.

· First, for an application to be considered complete and move to the review process it must include the following three components: a Project Narrative; a Budget Detail Worksheet and Narrative; and a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). MOUs that do not contain signatures are considered incomplete.

· Be sure that your project strategies and activities address the areas that you have identified on the data summary sheet. It is okay for projects to focus on one crime or on one age group or on one marginalized or underserved population. It does increase your chances of being awarded a grant by stating that you will address every crime if your project narrative only provides information on how you will address sexual assault. A strong application is focused on the crimes, age group, and population that will be served.

· Use the Application Checklist on pages 37 and 38. This checklist will help you ensure that all required documents are included in your application when you begin the submission process.

· Allow plenty of time to gather required information and submit well before the deadline.

· It is important to keep your audience in mind and make it easy for them to read and review your application. Use the heading and sub-heading titles that are in the solicitation. This will help the reviewer more easily follow the application. Be sure the application and responses to the program requirements and expectations are complete and clearly written. Use acronyms judicially, if at all. Remember that the reviewers are not familiar with your community and will not be familiar with the acronyms that your organization and project partners may use.

· Print out the application before submitting it to ensure appropriate formatting and adherence to page limit requirements.