field-test Books

This guide has hundreds of scholarahip opportunities as well as ideas and suggestions for finding some on your own.

I love this book. The information is up to date and complete and you get everything you need in one place to apply for scholarships. What I don't like about some of the other scholarship books is that they have scholarships that are only applicable if you attend a specific college. This book doesn't waste space on those types of limiting scholarships. Instead it has scholarships that are open no matter which college you attend. I think it's probably the best $20 you can spend to find scholarships you can win!

One of the biggest complaints about scholarship books is that you won't find enough scholarships. It is true that not every scholarship in this book will be applicable to you, but there are several reasons why I think this is the best of the bunch. First, you WILL find many, many scholarships that fit you. It will take some time, but it's definitely worth the effort and the way that this book is organized makes it as easy as it could be. Second, what this book has that others don't is information on what to do once you find the scholarships--tips on how to win the awards. I highly recommend this book to any student who is looking for money to pay for school.

I bought this book to look for scholarships for my high school child who will be going to college. Well, come to realize after reading through and scanning all the scholarships offered, only a small percentage are for high school students trying to raise money for college. Out of the 2043 scholarships they offer in this book by categories such as: General, Humanities/Arts, Social Sciences, Sciences, State of Residence, Membership, Ethnicity and Disability, I could only find 73 scholarships that she "might" be eligible for. They are almost all for small amounts- $1,000 or less also. It is a lot of work, for very little reward. There are less than 5 scholarships that are over $10,000 and the competition is fierce. A very large majority of the scholarships offered in this book are for college students, grad students, and adult students. I liked the book because it gives me a good "starting point", but I would say look for something geared more toward high school if that's what you need.

This book is a great resource to practice for the FAA's air traffic control exam. Most of the sections are exactly like what you will see on the exam. In some cases, the sections are actually harder than the real exam. Of course, doing well on this exam is helpful but it's not necessarily going to speed up your chances for employment at the FAA. The process takes a very long time regardless of the occasional status updates they feed you on the ASAP website. Good luck on the exam but don't think you will be hired soon after receiving your exam score, or referral status update, or offers for interviews. You are dealing with lazy federal employees who are in no hurry to do anything.

Book is a must buy if you intend on doing well on the AT-SAT. Granted I'm sure you could pass without it but why bother risking your career over the price of this book. Check it out. Buy this book, study it, and get yourself a decent career as an Air Traffic Controller. There are few mistakes in the book and the CD isn't the best but it does help. Try everything on the CD. Get used to using the number pad on the right of your keyboard it will help during the Scan Test. The Letter Factory doesn't work well at all but try it out so you know what to expect when you walk into the test. Here are a few other sites to help you out with the book and other stuff the test entails.

1. http://forums.jetcareers.com/air-traffic-control/67879-at-sat-math-prep-download.html
2. http://forums.jetcareers.com/air-traffic-control/61485-atsat-questions.html
3. http://forums.jetcareers.com/application-process-pubnat-at-sat-geo-prefs-annoucements/68240-everything-you-wanted-to-know-about-the-at-sat.html
4. http://www.atccti.com/atsat.html
5. http://forums.jetcareers.com/air-traffic-control/61975-the-at-sat-test.html
6. http://www.asa2fly.com/Air-Traffic-Control-Career-Prep-P714_product1.aspx

Link #6 is a product update to the software that comes with the CD.

70-85 on the AT-SAT is "qualified'
Over 85 is "well-qualified"
I studied this book and those links and got a 92.5. It would've been a higher score I believe but I got flustered and crashed several planes on the ATC Scenarios. I believe this book helped me out and I feel it can do the same for you.

Good Luck Everyone!

Steven

This is a good book to use for preparation to take the ATSAT. It also has lots of info on what it is like to go through ATC training, and what it might be like to be a controller in ZTL. The prep tests are not exact, but they are pretty close, and they are faster paced than the actual tests, so that helps improve your time. There are some differences between the tests and the practice, but this book will really help you if you're starting out cold without an ATC background or training.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who is preparing to take the AT-SAT exam. Had it not been for this book, I would have been totally lost on the test. I scored a 97.7 and I owe it mostly to the preparation and study guide included in this book but not only that it included a Cd-rom that resembled the test... !!!

All I can say is that the practice sets and cd-rom thoroughly prepared me for the AT-SAT. I received my book two and a half weeks before the test, and it prepared me so well that I ended with a test score above 95%. So thanks to Patrick Mattson I will soon be on my way to Oklahoma city and hopefully a very wonderful career in air traffic control!!!

This is the best way to prepare for the MTEL test. This book contains 3 practice tests. I took one each week prior to taking the MTEL test in September 2008. The tests in the book were harder than the actual test, and I felt that I couldn't have prepared better. The book gives you thorough preparation in grammar, with lots of detailed explanations. The vocabulary drills are excellent. There is also a wonderful 10 page section on frequently misspelled words that will help you recognize words you need to brush up on. The writing and reading subtests are invaluable. Practice with them, and you'll be comfortable with the test format, and will be much more relaxed on the test day. Whether you are a recent graduate or someone like me who graduated from college over 20 years ago, this book is the best investment you can make to do your best on the day of the test.

This title creates needless confusion for any MTEL candidate. It seems to this poor soul who made the mistake of purchasing this book, that the publisher has issued a generic literacy skills test book - a volume of little value in the MTEL test. Example: MTEL readings are not the writings, as shown in the book, of Thomas Hardy or Sigmund Freud (excuse me, Freud in translation?). MTEL includes writings of modern authors and from current textbooks. Please do not in any circumstances buy this title. If you happen to purchase this, you will undoubtedly want to return it to the publisher with a letter of indignation. Included in the letter the reader will probably have an enclosure of the one star you had to give this book in order to review it.

I highly recommend this book. I've been out of school for 20 years and this went over everything you should know. I passed on my first attempt. Be sure to take the time to study and you will do great. Buy it.

Excellent. It made the test so EASY to pass. I used them for the Math prep and was not as happy. But they were excellent for Comm and Lit.

I bought this to study for my MTELs and the promise of the latest, most up to date help sounded great. After taking (and passing) my tests I realized that not only was much of what the book said was going to be on the test was not, but the style of questions in the book were not consistent with the actual test as well. The MA Dept of Ed website has a FREE sample test and a description of what the day is like along with study info that was extremely helpful and accurate (and did I say FREE). The test questions offered in the book were often ambiguous and in a few instances wrong. Poor proofing - letter choice (A,B,C,D) on multiple choice questions wrong in the answer section, but the explanation revealed choice was correct - Question then remains - Was I get right the ones I marked right? Not very comforting. Overall I did get a decent quick grammar review, but the confidence I was hoping for was dashed with poorly written questions and proofing. They still say you need to bring photocopies of your IDs which have not been required for some time, just adding another wasted 50¢ to cost of this book.

All pharm textbooks fall into the trap of being neither textbook nor reference book. They want to just explain pharmacodynamics and end up like a drug guide. This book gets bogged down more than others. It does not offer much in terms of the textbook side, and it bogs down in the drug book side. Poor graphics. I ended up leaving this book on the shelf and got the Lehne book, which is good.

I received the product in the condition exactly as stated in the posting. Delivery arrived in a timely manner. I would definitely purchase from this buyer again.

I had to buy this book for my pharmacology class. I have been very satisfied with it. It has very detailed explanations, leaving few questions unanswered. The format is great.

A waste of money as the grant writing examples do not fit non-profit organizations. Workbook style and who has time to do the pages plus write the grant!

Thank you, the book arrived before the required date, which is always a bonus. the book was also in great condition. Again, I thank you!

I have been reading lots of books on how to write grants, being new to the field. They are all good, this one is concise and well laid out, the information is clear and the samples are good. I would recommend it. We will see how successful I am...that will be the real test of how well the book worked.

I am a consultant, grantwriter, and trainer who specializes in technical assistance and training for HIV/AIDS services. I provide a copy of this workbook to participants in my grantwriting ("Bringing Home the Money!) workshops, because it's a good, basic overview of many of the different parts of the request for funding proposal.

What's most useful about Carlson's book is that it provides a summary for participants and another way of explaining some of the things I teach. There are also good worksheets included in Carlson's book, designed to help first-time grantwriters grapple with the different proposal elements. Carlson also includes a CD-ROM with different forms that can also be helpful.

However, there are important limits to Carlson's book, thus the caveat in my review title that you NOT use this book alone.

1. Carlson's book is very general. For certain funders or funding areas (such as in HIV/AIDS), grantwriters need to include and be very familiar with things like public health data and certain standardized evaluation methods. You will not get that kind of information or guidance in Carlson's book.

2. Some of the sections lack sufficient details that can help first-time grantwriters better understand the concepts. For example, the budget and budget justification section are weak. She does not provide any explanation for "priority/target populations," a concept important to HIV/AIDS and other public health programs.

3. Carlson starts off with a good premise: Helping grantwriters understand the writing of a good proposal by having funders--the people who would actually read and decide on your proposal--speak about what makes good and bad proposals. It's a great idea and one that is the backbone to my own workshop. However, it is a thread that Carlson quickly drops and doesn't bother to integrate into the entire workbook.

4. Finally, the different elements are presented in such a way that they remain disintegrated, separate, fragmented from each other. In reality, a good proposal (i.e., one that is most likely to be funded) includes all the required elements (abstract, description of need, work plan, goals and objectives, evaluation, etc.) that are written well, are strong in content, and all work together in an integrated way.

To Carlson's credit on my last point, I should note that very few writers of grantwriting books and guides have succeeded in showing the latter, although I think it's one of the best signs of a well-written, strong, viable program.

In summary, then, this is a good first place to start if you're new to grantwriting or need a refresher. But definitely use it in conjunction with a great workshop and/or other grantwriting resources that are available.

If you come in to our nonprofit management support organization and ask for a book on grant proposal writing, there are two we'll pull out right away: Grassroots Grants and Winning Grants Step by Step. We're often asked which to choose. Of all the books we see, these are the two we most often recommend, but they do have different approaches.

Winning Grants Step by Step takes a pragmatic tone. It accepts the rules of the game and offers to show you how to win within them. "Most funders prefer to give grants for new and expanding programs or in support of special projects and new ideas rather than for the general operating expenses of an organization or the ongoing costs of established programs," it explains. "Because funders have these preferences, this workbook uses the idea of creating a new program as the basis for developing a proposal." (The book does also give examples of core operating support proposals, and does start with a planning guide to help you see which programs fit your priorities).
In the introduction to Grassroots Grants, on the other hand, the publisher shares her qualms about publishing a book about grants at all, preferring that the reader focus first on developing more renewable and less restricted gifts from individual donors. "This book is about two things: money and power," says Grassroots Grants, and calmly analyzes the dynamics of both in the grant proposal process. This big-picture view is in the end more pragmatic - it encourages you to take control of the grantseeking process by searching out those funders and pitching those programs that really best fit with what you are trying to do.

Both books have excellent project planning guidelines. As Winning Grants Step by Step observes, "Generally, organizations will spend approximately 80 percent of their time planning a project and only 20 percent of their time writing and packaging a proposal," so this section is obviously very important. Both books ask questions such as "What is unique about your organization's project?" "Is anyone else working on a similar project?" "What members of your community support each project?"

Both also contain useful information about finding appropriate funders, which is key to the process - much more important than your writing skills is finding the right funder who cares about projects like yours. Although Winning Grants Step by Step puts this information at the end in an appendix, you should really read it first, particularly the excellent section on corporate giving programs. Grassroots Grants contains very helpful guidelines about what to consider when deciding whether a funder is really a good fit for your organization, and detailed information about ways to develop good relationships with potential funders.

The books have different approaches to how they help you with your own writing. Winning Grants Step by Step has a workbook format, with questionnaires you fill out as you go, so that by the time you have completed them you will have addressed most of the subjects covered in a typical proposal, and it will be easy to cut and paste the appropriate bits into the funder's preferred format. It comes with all the worksheets on a CD-ROM so you can fill them out electronically and reuse them. If you like project planning, but get nervous about the writing process, this format may help walk you through. Grassroots Grants has questionnaires throughout the text, and it has more examples of proposals, query letters, and other documents with notes on how they were developed. If you like to write by reading examples to inspire you to your own purposes, this book will suit you.

Ultimately, these books complement one another. Even if you prefer the workbook format of Winning Grants Step by Step, the "big picture" you get from reading Grassroots Grants will help you answer all those questions. Likewise, if you prefer the style of Grassroots Grants, you can still benefit from the excellent sections on overhead costs and planning for sustainability in Winning Grants Step by Step.

Now in a completely revised and updated fourth edition, Post Office Jobs by federal employment expert Dennis Damp, continues to be the definitive resource and instruction guide workbook for anyone seeking employment in the U.S. Postal Service. Post Office Jobs offers the prospective applicant an eight step process to securing a post office position. These steps include identifying all job vacancies; matching personal skills to postal jobs; locating postal exam test dates; specifically studying for the new 473 Postal Exam; accurately completing job application forms; preparing and practicing for job interviews; applying for jobs that don't require exams; and exploring viable civil service job options. Post Office Jobs is enhanced a wealth of accessible contact information including current addresses and phone numbers for the eighty hiring Postal Districts, on-line Internet connections and website addresses, the new pay scales, web sites that offer employment guidance, and even toll-free postal service employment hotlines. New to this expanded edition of Post Office Jobs is the inclusion of informed and informative chapter son Postal Inspector jobs. Thoroughly "user friendly" and ideal for the non-specialist general reader seeking either seasonal, temporary, or permanent employment within the U.S. Postal Service, Post Office Jobs is a "must" -- and should also be a part of any city, town, and village public library employment resource shelf, as well as every community highschool and technical college library Jobs/Careers reference collection.

My daughter and I recently took the postal exam for carrier/clerk/sales. After using some of the techniques, we both found the test to be a lot easier then we both expected. We both put this book to good use. I would recommend this book for anyone who is taking the exam. Whether the exam is for City Carrier or Rural Route, Clerk or any other position, this book will give you what you need and is an excellent source of information.

This book is amazingly interesting and informative. I can't wait to travel the state of Utah with this book as a guide!

I'd recommend a little study of geology, and the formations found in Utah before hitting the road with this book. KC Publications 48 page glossy color "Colorado Plateau", which I found at one of the National Parks, gives you a great introduction to a good fraction of Utah and shows the positions of the formations along with a time line. If you are a layman at geology, unless you prepare, you will get dizzy with references to formations aided only by black and white pictures. The lack of color illustrations is puzzling when color means so much in identification of rocks in the area. If you can easily recognize formations, this book is a great aid as you travel.

If you are interested in Geology, Utah is a wonderful place to travel in. From the layercake sedimentary rock of the colorado plateau, to the contorted ranges of the great basin, there is much to see in Utah. The author gives you a basic understanding of Utah's geologic history and then applies it as you travel through various bi-ways.

For more indepth discussion of Utah's geology, try to find a copy of William Lee Stokes or Lehi Hintze's book. You might be able to find them at the Dept. of Natural Resources bookstore in Salt Lake City.

I welcome feedback on this and all reviews at wstrnlibwarrior@yahoo.com

I just spent two weeks on the Colorado plateau with a geology field studies class. This, a geo dictionary and Desert Solitaire were the only books I brought with me (I came home with more of course!), and I was OK. I would say that the layout of the book is fairly accessible. If you are familiar with the series, you know it is arranged by highway. Compared however with the lecture notes I was taking, the geology was rather rudimentary. But, if you are just passing through (be sure to haul along Roadside Arizona, Colorado, or wherever else you may be when you run out of Utah road, and the book dead ends) than this book is sufficient.

Five stars because it is exactly what it says it is.