Meet Our New AI Grant Writer, Ms. Sharon Doering-Domanus!

The Acronym had the opportunity to speak with IMSA’s new Grant Writer, Ms. Sharon Doering-Domanus, to learn more about her background and future ambitions for IMSA. 

Composed of a five-person team, IMSA’s Development department strives to offer various educational programs, initiatives, and projects for the enrichment of the IMSA community. In November of the 2023-24 academic year, IMSA welcomed Ms. Sharon Doering-Domanus as the new grant writer in the Development department. To gain and share some insight with the IMSA community, The Acronym sat down with her to discuss long-term goals and visions for the athletic program. But first, let’s learn a bit more about her background.

Ms. Doering-Domanus has an interest in science, higher education, and writing. She has a Masters from Northwestern University in Biotechnology. She was once a teacher at Columbia College in downtown Chicago. Two of her other past positions include being a storyteller and working as a copywriter at a clinic. She adds, “Grant writing draws upon knowledge of science.”

When asked about what she hopes to bring to IMSA, ​​Ms. Doering-Domanus describes her work as a, “Cool opportunity to get people and students the funds they need for cool programs they want to support. Students have interesting projects, and I want to immerse students in that.” She also mentions that “it is fun being around a young environment, especially the IMSA community because it’s so unique. It’s really exciting to build these one-of-a-kind programs for the IMSA students.”

However, Ms. Doering-Domanus mentions that there are several challenges associated with AI grant writing: “The challenge for getting funding is rejection all the time.” She explains how she is quite experienced with facing rejection from work as an author, “the challenge is that it is competitive and kind of low-reward, [so] you need to be persistent at all times.” 

AI Grant writing is a very important position, regardless. Ms. Doering-Domanus explains, “A lot of programs could use funding right now. There’s always a need for funding.” Elaborating more on the details of her position, she states, “Putting a grant together is a huge teamwork effort and process: asking questions about budget and information.” She also mentions that this effort requires a lot of coordination and cooperation with her entire team: “I work extensively with the curriculum team and with others as well, such as the office of advancement.”

Lastly, we gauged Ms. Doering-Domanus’s liking of IMSA in the four months she has been here. She states, “Being here has been really amazing so far. I’ve met a lot of well-intentioned good people. I hope to help people fund their different programs and help support the school.”