Pursuing Grant Funds in Higher Education Post-“Sugar High” From Government Pandemic Funds: A Case

Abstract

Some governments provided financial assistance to their respective populations during the shutdowns and social distancing period of the SARS-CoV-2 / COVID-19 pandemic of late 2019 – mid 2023. In that time, institutions of higher education were able to access funds to maintain programs from the federal, state, and county governments. By 2024, with the end of the pandemic and people partially returned to work, community colleges were again having to reach broadly to find grant funds for supplementary funding to bolster higher education, as the schools are fast approaching the “enrollment cliff” (a large drop in student enrollments) based on population demographics expected in 2025. This work describes some observations about grant writing in higher education from this particular slice-in-time, based on work-based observations and abductive logic.