Aberdeen Township (New Jersey) Congregate Meals Grant Proposal

Aberdeen Township (New Jersey) Congregate Meals Grant Proposal

Background Information

Every aged person in Aberdeen and beyond deserves to live a dignified life. The Aberdeen township senior community foundation preserves and enhances the wellbeing and dignity of every adult residing in Aberdeen. This it does through the provision of assorted basic services that augment social relationships, nurture physical health, encourages self-reliance, and promote educational interests. The congregate meal program offers nutritious meals, including breakfast and lunch, and social teas once every month. Through the lunch program, individuals get their daily nutritional needs (Beasley et al., 2018).

Also, through congregate meals, participants are able to come together, thus promoting social contact and the provision of opportunities for the establishment of friendships (Lloyd & Wellman, 2015). Since the foundation serves seniors with low to moderate fixed incomes, service fees are kept as low as possible. Even though the community foundation offers a number of programs for free and a few at a minimal cost, this particular program is requesting a grant since it is quite costly. The donation will be beneficial in linking the gap between the costs of delivering quality programming and received revenue.

The Aberdeen township senior center has several opportunities to assist seniors. Among the possibilities include a physical and mental exercise that needs $ 10000, and a breakfast and lunch program that serves the aged with dementia and their caregivers that needs $ 23500, afternoon tea socials carried out once a month that needs $23785, and dinner with friends that needs $ 35930. This adds up to a total of about $93215. The annual budget for the program is $ 136885. The program expenses add up to 68%. 28% of the total budget is for administrative purposes, while the remaining 7% is for fundraising. An increase in financial supply would, therefore, ensure that quality services are offered to the clients.

Significance of the Project to the Community

Like any other individual, the aged also require physical and mental exercise to remain active, healthy, and psychologically fit. Frequent physical activity among the elderly has been found to prevent diseases, improve mental wellbeing, enhance cognitive functions, strengthen social ties, and minimize the risk of falls.

Unlike other programs such as the home for the elderly that often limit the movement of the aged, this program is friendly. It allows the clients to continue living with their family members while they attend the services. The breakfast, lunch, and dinner periods offered by the program would ensure healthy social interactions among the members, which is critical for the psychological wellbeing of the elderly.

Project Timeline

A comprehensive grant timeline will enable the reviewers to understand how the Aberdeen township senior community foundation plans to stage and conduct the various programs. Further, such a schedule will assist in assuring that the group has put in place the proper plans for the process, with a clear outline of the significant tasks that will be completed in the course of the grant’s lifecycle (Deckard, 2015).

A timeline allows every activity a specified period for completion and hence ensures that every event has been attended to within the time requirements. It is essential to recognize that all the activities for the foundation run across the year, with each program allocated a specific time. Equally, a timeline in this context does not refer to the time when activity occurs but its frequency.

Figure 1.00: Project Timeline

Project Budget

The foundation has only four critical that require funding to be actualized. The organization wants to hold physical and mental exercise every month for the whole year. Among the opportunities include a physical and psychological activity that needs $ 10000, and a breakfast and lunch program that serves the aged with dementia and their caregivers that needs $ 23500, afternoon tea socials carried out once a month that needs $23785, and dinner with friends that needs $ 35930.

The total amount required for the four critical activities is, therefore, about $93215. The annual budget for the program is $ 136885. The program expenses add up to 68%. 28% of the total budget is for administrative purposes, while the remaining 7% is for fundraising. An increase in financial supply would, therefore, ensure that quality services are offered to the clients.

Figure 1.02: Project Budget

Considering that the program does not run on a daily basis, the administrative procedures will be handled by a director whose salary is not included in the grant budget. The 28% will assist the director in effectuating the functions, processes that may consist of employment of part-time staff, payment of rents, and such. For the proposed budgets, approximately 28% will be for administrative purposes, such as paying off staff with the rest going to the actual program.

Project Evaluation

Being a continuous project, continuous evaluation of progress is critical; in this light, the project’s progress can be viewed through a weekly update of the schedules, and an update of the programs once complete. According to UONDC (2020), project evaluation is a systematic process that involves the objective assessment of a project in progress to find out whether it is still relevant to achieving its objectives.

With the ultimate aim of the program being towards achieving a dignified livelihood for all the aged in Aberdeen, a review of the wellbeing of the old will be the leading evaluation benchmark; this is possible through following such a methodology as constant review of their living situations, gathering evidence through evaluative interviews, analysis of the evidence and ensuring follow-up (Pietroforte, 2011; Thomas, Lam, Nutt &Thase, 2018).

Challenges of the Grant

A significant problem that the grant may face is oversight and mismanagement. Even though the impact of the program is essential, it is restricted by insufficient budget as a result of mismanagement by the administration. Among other issues facing grants include problems with financial stability, foundation management policies, inadequate personnel policies, internal management deficiencies, and insufficient organizational structures (Sontag-Padilla, Staplefoote& Gonzalez, 2012).

Grant proposals are not easy to come up with. From the application of grants that take time to complete to the involved reporting necessities that vary from one donor to the next, several granters unintentionally put enormous burdens on the grantees. Even though varied sources of funding are seen as ideal, this may not be the case as multiple funding sources means hundreds of reports and applications, and accountability to several funders with different priorities (Sontag-Padilla, Staplefoote& Gonzalez, 2012).

Regardless of the significance of infrastructure to the community foundation, granters mostly prefer to offer their support in terms of direct service and program delivery. This usually results in infrastructure underinvestment required for growth and sustenance. A number of grant providers typically imagine that once grantees become successful, they ultimately lessen their dependence on funding by foundations and take care of their operational costs. For several non-profits, this is not possible.

Sustainability, for most of them, entails having the ability to raise sufficient funds that enable them to do their work well (Sontag-Padilla, Staplefoote& Gonzalez, 2012). The knowledge gap is another issue facing grants. Both grant providers and granters face the problem of the knowledge gap. Even though money is provided to grant providers, most of them are skilled in particular programs and lack expertise in grant management, significantly affecting their ability to assess program budgets and financial capacity.

Conclusion

With everything seemingly turning against them, the elderly require love and support as the clock ticks quite fast for them. It is at this moment that they even special treatment than other members of society. Unfortunately, many nations have disregarded this group of people, leaving them to suffer on their own. Some organizations that have significantly tried to help them have always created homes for these vulnerable individuals with less regard than they need their families too, during this critical moment of their lives.

It is now the responsibility of the Aberdeen township senior community foundation to bridge this gap of isolation that has, for a long time, been a problem. As specified in this grant proposal, the programs offered by the organizations are considerate of every aspect of the older people. The plan touches on their social, physical, and psychological wellbeing. However, the implementation of these programs requires monetary input, which is the basis for this grant application. It is essential to treat the elderly with dignity because, at some point, we would too find ourselves in a similar situation. It is crucial to note that old age is not an optional thing.

References

Beasley, J. M., Sevick, M. A., Kirshner, L., Mangold, M., & Chodosh, J. (2018). Congregate meals: opportunities to help vulnerable older adults achieve diet and physical activity recommendations. The Journal of frailty & aging, 7(3), 182-186.

Deckard, L. (2015). Developing Timelines and Milestone Charts for Your Proposal. Research  Development& Grant Writing News, 6(2): 24-27.

Lloyd, J. L., & Wellman, N. S. (2015). Older Americans Act Nutrition Programs: A community-based nutrition program helping older adults remain at home. Journal of nutrition in gerontology and geriatrics, 34(2), 90-109.

Pietroforte, R. (2011). Toward More Sustainable Infrastructure: Project Evaluation for Planners and Engineers. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.

Sontag-Padilla, L., Staplefoote, B. L., & Gonzalez, Morganti, K. (2012). Financial sustainability for nonprofit organizations: A review of the literature.

Thomas, W. H., Lam, R. W., Nutt, D. J., &Thase, M. E. (2018). The basics of project evaluation  and lessons learned. Boca Raton: CRC Press.

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, UONDC (2020). Evaluation in the  project/programme cycle. Retrieved from
https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/evaluation/evaluation-and-the-project-programme-c (Links toan external site.)ycle.html