That was the mantra repeated throughout a workshop last night on grant-writing for our visiting Kenyan Fellows. The workshop was taught by Dr. Robert (Bob) Kingston of Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, who spoke from decades of experience on both sides of the granting process – as applicant and reviewer.  

The Fellows themselves reported various levels of experience with grant-writing. Nicholas Gikonyo said “I have written many grants, but those that have won (funding) are few.”

Nicholas’ comment points to two problems: Funding specifically for science in Africa is woefully inadequate. And African scientists may be inadequately equipped to compete for international funding.

Funding for African science:

Our Fellows explained that most of the grants they have applied for or received have been 1 year grants. A scientific project can rarely be completed in 1 year. This means that these scientists must reapply for funding every year, spending a great deal of their time and contending with the chance that the projects they start won’t receive funding for completion. The funds rarely cover stipends for their students either, they said. So students wishing to pursue research often fund themselves out-of-pocket.

The bottom line: funding agencies must commit to multi-year grants that provide adequate funding for equipment, supplies, reagents AND stipends.

Knowing how to apply:

The top 3 things grant writers have to accomplish, said Bob Kingston, are to demonstrate the importance of the problem they wish to address; to demonstrate they have an important novel insight into these problems; and to convince the reviewers that they can accomplish the experiments proposed.

In speaking about their research, the Fellows clearly demonstrated passion for their topics and an understanding of their scientific and social impact. They are working on important issues – but perhaps had not realized before that their reviewers might not realize that without their help.

Workshops like these are tailored to address such lack of awareness of the tricks of the trade. Our Fellows had not participated in such a course before and said they did not know of any resources at home to help guide and edit the scientific aspects of their grant proposals.

Demonstrating that they can accomplish the experiments, however, poses a different kind of challenge. At a university with restricted funding for infrastructure and capital equipment, they may in fact not be in position to propose the right experiments or do all the experiments they wish.  

Finding collaborators at other institutions who do have the appropriate tools is one way to solve this problem. Making sure scientists have access to current literature so they know the right techniques for the questions they wish to ask is another.

Scientists in Africa have access to fascinating and important research questions. Making sure they can access the resources to study them is critical.

Seeding Labs’ Fellows will spend the rest of the summer drafting and workshopping grant proposals for their projects, and will return to Kenya prepared to teach other colleagues how to write winning proposals and submit their own proposals. We look forward to all their success.