I imagine it’s complicated to release details about projects that aren’t selected to receive a grant. Presumably there are reasons the project wasn’t selected. If EA Grants wanted to publicize their rejects, seems like they have two main options:
1) Make the project public without explaining their reasons for rejecting it. In this case, EA Grants might be making it more likely that a bad project is funded, by bringing it to the attention of other funders without warning them of possible pitfalls.
2) Make the project public AND explain their reasons. This might work, but takes up more time and social capital. EA Grants would have to spend time figuring out how to phrase their reasons diplomatically, so that a) their rejects weren’t too discouraged or angry, b) other excellent candidates aren’t discouraged from applying, c) other funders are appropriately warned, etc. It’s hard to balance all of this. CEA also wouldn’t be able to disclose confidential information that their decision might rely on, making it even trickier.
In summary: I think this is a lot harder than it might initially appear. (That said, there might still be good ways to do it?)
Thanks for engaging with this itty. I agree that option (2) would be onerous for EA grants.
However I don’t see how option (1) makes things worse? They could simply publish the grant applications without endorsement or indeed any comment beyond the fact that those projects didn’t make the cut.
If they don’t do this, funders like me are simply left to find funding opportunities on their own.
We are still working on the grant application form. I will add an option to the form that allows us to pass it on to EA Grants, BERI, etc. if our angels are unable to fund it.
We also believe that early-stage grant opportunities should be made more transparent, and we even proposed a system in our post to create an “online portal to enable the broader community to discover grant opportunities, add their thoughts on the relative merits and risks of grant proposals, and directly fund grants without an intermediary.” Making an online portal is more involved than making an angel group but it is possible we may launch something like this in the coming months.
We have already reached out to CEA regarding getting access to EA Grants’ grant opportunities. Once our angel group gets going, I intend on resuming our contact with CEA to see what we can do regarding sharing grant opportunities in the early-stage funding space.
CEA doesn’t seem to be as responsive on the EA Forum but we have been able to communicate with them via direct outreach.
Great idea—this is very much the way I want to use my philanthropy!
To support this, I asked in the EA forum post about EA grants whether unsuccessful applications to EA grants could be made public (with the applicant’s permission, of course) so that others could look into those funding opportunities. http://effective-altruism.com/ea/1t9/ea_grants_applications_are_now_open/fq9
It seems this has had no reply
I imagine it’s complicated to release details about projects that aren’t selected to receive a grant. Presumably there are reasons the project wasn’t selected. If EA Grants wanted to publicize their rejects, seems like they have two main options:
1) Make the project public without explaining their reasons for rejecting it. In this case, EA Grants might be making it more likely that a bad project is funded, by bringing it to the attention of other funders without warning them of possible pitfalls.
2) Make the project public AND explain their reasons. This might work, but takes up more time and social capital. EA Grants would have to spend time figuring out how to phrase their reasons diplomatically, so that a) their rejects weren’t too discouraged or angry, b) other excellent candidates aren’t discouraged from applying, c) other funders are appropriately warned, etc. It’s hard to balance all of this. CEA also wouldn’t be able to disclose confidential information that their decision might rely on, making it even trickier.
In summary: I think this is a lot harder than it might initially appear. (That said, there might still be good ways to do it?)
Thanks for engaging with this itty. I agree that option (2) would be onerous for EA grants.
However I don’t see how option (1) makes things worse? They could simply publish the grant applications without endorsement or indeed any comment beyond the fact that those projects didn’t make the cut.
If they don’t do this, funders like me are simply left to find funding opportunities on their own.
Thanks Sanjay!
We are still working on the grant application form. I will add an option to the form that allows us to pass it on to EA Grants, BERI, etc. if our angels are unable to fund it.
Thanks for the supportive words Sanjay!
We also believe that early-stage grant opportunities should be made more transparent, and we even proposed a system in our post to create an “online portal to enable the broader community to discover grant opportunities, add their thoughts on the relative merits and risks of grant proposals, and directly fund grants without an intermediary.” Making an online portal is more involved than making an angel group but it is possible we may launch something like this in the coming months.
We have already reached out to CEA regarding getting access to EA Grants’ grant opportunities. Once our angel group gets going, I intend on resuming our contact with CEA to see what we can do regarding sharing grant opportunities in the early-stage funding space.
CEA doesn’t seem to be as responsive on the EA Forum but we have been able to communicate with them via direct outreach.