Mrs. Trujillo:
Your research and conclusions are dead on. In fact, I'd say that more than 99% of the information on Federal grants is false.
Federal grants are awarded by various government agencies to enable research organizations, state and local governments, colleges and universities, and social service organizations to perform a service - a service that the government finds useful or necessary.
For example, a local social services organization might need help establishing a new food bank service for the hardcore homeless of a rural community in Wyoming. Either their grant writer, or a professional agency would sit down and put together dozens of pages of grant application, trying to convince the government of the need for the service, and the organization's unique qualifications for providing it.
The key is that the government awards "grants" for DOING something. Grants are not awarded for being part of some group, or having some handicap, or being a single mom, or being in a really bad financial bind.
The government offers ONE large-scale group of grant program for individuals - those are the grants that are part of the post-secondary financial aid system - grants for college. Even that's a situation where the government is supporting people who "do something" - because it's a good public policy to encourage the population to become educated. An educated population is a healthier, more efficient, and more self-supporting organization than a less educated one. So the government awards grants to students who would otherwise be unable to afford the cost of a college or technical education.
If you want a financial aid grant, you must be a registered student at an eligible institution of higher education. The "grants" are paid directly to the school on your behalf, so you can't qualify unless you will be attending one of these schools.
You apply for all forms of federal student aid, including the various grant programs, by completing the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, better known as the FAFSA.
When completing the FAFSA, you'll answer more than 100 questions about your personal and financial circumstances, and that information will be used to evaluate your financial aid need. The Department of Education will calculate an Expected Family Contribution score, and send that score to any school that you ask them to send it to. The financial aid office at that school will use your EFC score to determine what forms of aid you qualify for, and what types of aid the school has available.
If your EFC score is particularly low (less than 4041), you are said to have demonstrated "exceptional need", and you will qualify for the need-based forms of financial aid - these are the types of aid that include grants. If you do not demonstrate exceptional need, you will be offered access to the government's Stafford lending program.
There are NO forms of grants for personal financial assistance, like paying bills, fixing up your house, avoiding foreclosure, etc. There are also NO forms of grants for being a single mom, being an Aleutian eskimo, or being the direct descendant of a Mayflower Pilgrim.
The government DOES provide financial assistance - but those are not grant programs, those are means-tested government benefits programs. You've heard of these programs before - they're things like SSI, Food Stamps, TANF (which used to be called welfare), Veteran's benefits, disaster relief - programs like those. They're called "means tested" benefits, because applicants can only qualify if they have very low incomes and very few assets.
I hope this information helped you - to complete the FAFSA, make sure that you visit the only official US Department of Education website, http://fafsa.ed.gov . If you want more information on the federal student aid system, I highly recommend the Department of Education pamphlet that I'm linking below.
Good luck!