The scoring table tells you where the points are
How are grant applications scored?
Against published criteria with published weights, in most competitive programmes. A federal announcement will typically name four to six criteria and give each a point value: need 20, approach 35, capacity 25, evaluation 20. Reviewers score each one separately and the total decides your rank. The cheapest advantage in any competition is allocating your effort to match those weights, and almost nobody does it, because the natural instinct is to write most about the part you find most interesting.
Last reviewed 10 August 2026.
How to use the table
- Count the points, then count your pages
- If approach is 35 of 100 and you have given it a fifth of your narrative, you have mispriced it. The ratio does not have to be exact and it should not be inverted.
- Use their headings
- Name your sections after their criteria. A reviewer scoring capacity should find a section called capacity. This is free and it is the single most common thing strong applications get wrong.
- Answer every sub-bullet
- Criteria usually decompose into three or four sub-questions, and reviewers frequently score those individually. An unanswered sub-bullet is a zero on something you could have written in two sentences.
- Notice what is worth nothing
- Sections carrying no points still have to be present and correct, and they do not deserve your best hours. Organizational background at zero points is a compliance item, not a competition.
Where Quillify comes in
The evaluator scores your draft against the criteria in the actual announcement, the way a reviewer would, and returns a prioritized list of what is weak rather than a general assessment. If Quillify wrote the draft it can apply the fixes itself.
It also runs a three-minute skim test, which checks whether a reviewer moving fast can locate your answer to each criterion. Findable and answered are different things, and the scoring table only rewards both.
Who asks this most
The answer above is the same whoever you are. What Quillify does about it is not.
Related
- How a reviewer actually reads your proposalHow do grant reviewers actually read proposals?
- Write for the person who has 39 others to readHow do grant reviewers actually read proposals?
- How to read a funding announcementHow do I read a NOFO or funding announcement properly?
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