Video 1: Overview of ANA and the Funding Opportunities

Overview of ANA and the Funding Opportunities

This section will provide you with an introduction to the Administration for Native Americans, their vision, mission and goals, along with the funding opportunities available to eligible applicants.

ANA is housed in the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, and serves all federally and state recognized American Indian and Alaska Native tribes, tribal organizations, Native Hawaiian, American Samoan, Chamorro and Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands organizations.

ANA promotes self-sufficiency for Native Americans by providing discretionary grant funding for community-based projects and training and technical assistance to eligible tribes and Native organizations in three program areas: Social and Economic Development Strategies, Native Languages, and Environmental Regulatory Enhancement.

  • Hello and welcome to the 2025 ANA pre-application training. My name is Eric Watson, training manager for the Alaska Region TTA Center, and I'll be your guide. I am part of a small but mighty team of individuals dedicated to supporting Alaska native tribes and Alaska native organizations.
  • You can contact us at www.anaalaska.org or at (809) 948-3158. The goal for this training is to learn how to develop and submit a successful application for an ANA grant to support your community-based projects. We recommend having the pre-application manual and notice of funding opportunity available. Also, accessing our virtual USB drive for helpful materials and templates, and then also bringing your project idea.
  • The flow for this training is that we will discuss concepts for each section where we will be addressing criteria directly from the notice of funding opportunities. We'll also provide additional information, best practices, strategies, and examples to help you fully develop your application.
  • As a reminder, the mission of ANA is to support Native-led nonprofits and eligible tribes by promoting self-sufficiency, providing funding for community-based projects, and providing free training and technical assistance. The vision of ANA is that all native communities are thriving.
  • So currently ANA has two funding opportunities available, the Social and Economic Development Strategies, also known as SEDS, and the Social and Economic Development Strategies for Alaska, also known as SEDS-AK. Here's a look at the different funding amounts and length of projects for each award, both SEDS and SEDS-AK can be up to three-year projects with budgets up to 900,000 for three-year projects.
  • SEDS promotes social well-being, perpetuation of culture, and economic self-sufficiency. These projects can range from one to three years, and this is a national award. The next opportunity is the SEDS-AK, SEDS-AK also funds one to three-year projects that are designed to provide targeted supports for village-specific projects to improve and strengthen the administrative and management capacity of Alaska Native Village governments. The project year for both awards run from September '30 to September '29, and budgets can be 300,000 each year for a ceiling of 900,000 for a three-year project.
  • Okay, so before we start this training, I would like to encourage you to become as familiar as possible with the NOFO. Spend a lot of time reading it and understanding what the expectation from ANA is before you start the application process. The NOFOs are separated into six steps. This step that we're going to focus on throughout this training is step four, which has the merit review criteria. I would just like you to be aware that other steps do contain useful information regarding the NOFO itself and the funding opportunity, and the submission process, and then what happens next.
  • Here's a look at the funding timeline. The NOFOs were published on June 20th, 2025. Both opportunities have an application due date of July 22nd, 2025, and both opportunities have a project start date of September 30th, 2025. I would like to encourage you all to submit early. You want to avoid any technical delays or things that may happen in the submission process.
  • Here's a look at all the eligible entities that can apply for the ANA SEDS and SEDS-AK opportunities. All applications do require a governing body document to be eligible to apply. All applications should include this document demonstrating that the governing body of an organization approves the application submission to ANA. Also, another requirement is the assurance of community representation. If you're not a federally or state recognized tribe or Alaska Native Village government, you must provide this document showing that a majority of your board members are Alaska native or American Indian.
  • Here's a look at ineligible entities that are not able to apply for ANA. And it's also worth noting that ANA does not fund the following activities. So, no new construction, no reimbursement for pre-award costs, there's a comprehensive list here.
  • Another suggestion I would like to give you is to make sure that you are registered or that your registration is current with the following systems. You'll need these to complete your submission for ANA, for the SEDS and the SEDS-AK, so just make sure that you have your SAM account up to date, your UEI is current, grants.gov is current, and also creating a workspace in grants.gov, that will be necessary for submitting.
  • And here's a look at the 2025 ANA pre-application manual. This manual supplements this training, provides the activities we'll be covering, and can be found both on our training website and also the virtual USB drive.
  • So I would like to emphasize that ANA funds community-led projects. This increases buy-in and it really leads to the success of a project. So try to keep this in mind when you're developing your project and filling out your application. Also, some strategies we'd like to encourage you doing throughout the application process is to make sure others review your work and then make sure that you have a consistent voice in your application, which is really needed when you're having multiple people help write an opportunity.
  • Double-checking formulas, starting early. The last thing I want to leave you with is that we are a resource for you to utilize, so we can help review documents, we can review your application before submission and we can answer questions along the way.
  • The last slide for this section is the criteria elements that we'll be discussing throughout these training. These, the merit review criteria are the elements that will be scored upon when the merit review process happens. This will be a blueprint for us throughout this training.

Up next

Video 2: Project Introduction

Project Introduction

Training episodes

Video 1: Overview of ANA and the Funding Opportunities
Video 1: Overview of ANA and the Funding Opportunities
Video 2: Project Introduction
Video 2: Project Introduction
Video 3: Current Community Condition
Video 3: Current Community Condition
Video 4: Project Goals
Video 4: Project Goals
Video 5: Objectives
Video 5: Objectives
Video 6: Project Implementation Plan
Video 6: Project Implementation Plan
Video 7: Community Based Strategy
Video 7: Community Based Strategy
Video 8: Population to be Served
Video 8: Population to be Served
Video 9: Outcomes
Video 9: Outcomes
Video 10: Objective Work Plan
Video 10: Objective Work Plan
Video 11: Data Management Plan
Video 11: Data Management Plan
Video 12: Staffing Plan
Video 12: Staffing Plan
Video 13: Partnerships and Consultants
Video 13: Partnerships and Consultants
Video 14: Oversight Plan
Video 14: Oversight Plan
Video 15: Line Item Budget and Budget Narrative
Video 15: Line Item Budget and Budget Narrative
Video 16: Preparing your ANA Application
Video 16: Preparing your ANA Application
Video 17: Submitting the Application to ANA
Video 17: Submitting the Application to ANA
Video 18: Conclusion
Video 18: Conclusion