The National Science Foundation has updated and revised their Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) regarding current and pending support.
The FAQs have been revised alongside the newly developed table, NSF Pre-award and Post-award Disclosures Relating to the Biographical Sketch and Current and Pending Support.
Contact the Policy Office in the Division of Institution and Award Support at policy@nsf.gov with any questions.
The University of Akron’s Office of Research Administration has been informed by the Head of the Policy Office at the National Science Foundation, Jean Feldman, of the following changes:
“We are pleased to announce that a revised version of the NSF Proposal & Award Policies & Procedures Guide (PAPPG) (NSF 22-1) has been issued.
The new PAPPG will be effective for proposals submitted or due on or after October 4, 2021. Significant changes include:
You are encouraged to review the by-chapter summary of changes provided in the Introduction section of the PAPPG.
NSF plans to conduct a webinar covering these changes. Visit the NSF policy outreach website to sign up for notifications about this and other outreach events.
While this version of the PAPPG becomes effective on October 4, 2021, in the interim, the guidelines contained in the current PAPPG (NSF 20-1) continue to apply.
If you have any questions regarding these changes, please contact the DIAS/Policy Office at policy@nsf.gov.”
Effective Jan. 1, 2019, UA implemented a new policy for externally funded proposal submissions. This policy is intended to lessen the General Fund investment of research and other sponsored programs performed for outside governmental and private granting organizations. There are two changes that researchers and others who work with research and other sponsored programs must be aware:
The full policy document can be read online on the Office of Research Administration website, (or from the ORA Policies webpage. The ORA is creating a FAQ to help ensure good communication and consistent handling as everyone adjusts to these changes.
Early in 2019, UA will implement a more comprehensive policy that integrates this new Research Policy with faculty workloads and RTP/merit evaluations.
Congratulations to Mrs. Emily Njus who has accepted a promotion to Manager, Pre-Award Research Administration, effective August 1, 2018.
Emily’s connection to UA 
began when she was a child and would come to UA with her late father, Dr. Glen Njus, Biomedical Engineering. She went on to earn her Bachelor of Science in Biology. Her work as a student assistant lead to her position as Research Vivarium Supervisor, and then to Senior Grants Coordinator in the Office of Research Administration. She left UA for Summa Health, where she spent over two years gaining valuable grants administration experience from a non-higher education perspective. As Manager of Pre-Award Administration, Emily hopes to utilize her Lean Six Sigma Black Belt and her other knowledge and skills to help the ORA better serve UA’s researchers.
Beginning on April 30, 2018, proposers will be able to prepare and submit full, research non-collaborative proposals in the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Research.gov system. The initial release of this new Research.gov capability will run in parallel with existing FastLane proposal preparation and submission capabilities. As a result, proposers can choose to prepare and submit full, research non-collaborative proposals in Research.gov or in FastLane starting on April 30, 2018. Other proposal types will be added to Research.gov in the future. Please note, proposals initiated in the new system will not be available in FastLane and proposals prepared in FastLane will not be available in the new system. This new system is being developed incrementally and as capabilities are migrated from FastLane to Research.gov, the system features will expand until it eventually replaces FastLane for proposal preparation and submission. There will be no impact to Grants.gov and Application Submission Web Services (ASWS), and NSF will continue to fully support these proposal submission methods.
The Research.gov proposal site modernizes proposal preparation and submission capabilities and focuses on enhancing the user experience and reducing administrative burden with an intuitive interface and real-time compliance checking. The new functionality provides the ability to create, submit, track, and update proposals associated with active NSF funding opportunities and furthers NSF’s goal to provide quick access to proposal information and grants management services in one location.
Research.gov Proposal Preparation Site Preview
On February 26, 2018, NSF began previewing the new Research.gov proposal preparation site to the research community to collect preliminary feedback and to provide the community an opportunity to become familiar with the new interface before the official site launch on April 30, 2018. The preview will continue until 8:00PM EDT on April 27, 2018, and allows any research community user with a FastLane or Research.gov account to test the new Research.gov proposal preparation features.
We encourage you to check out the preview site before April 27, 2018. Please keep in mind that all test data entered on the Research.gov proposal preparation site during the preview period (February 26, 2018 through April 27, 2018) will be deleted before the full site is launched on April 30, 2018.
Feedback on Proposal Preparation Site Preview
Feedback from the research community and NSF staff about proposal preparation in Research.gov during the preview period is critical to NSF and will be used to enhance and expand Research.gov incrementally. Feedback on the Research.gov preview site may be submitted via this link: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/ProposalPreparation.
Additional Information
Resources including Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) and a system capabilities release timeline are available on the Research.gov About Proposal Preparation and Submission page. A series of short instructional videos is currently in development and will be posted on the About Proposal Preparation and Submission page.
We hope that you are as excited as we are about the official launch of the Research.gov proposal preparation and submission site for full, research non-collaborative proposals on April 30, 2018!
For IT system-related questions, please contact the NSF Help Desk at 1-800-381-1532 or rgov@nsf.gov. Policy-related questions should be directed to policy@nsf.gov.
Regards,
The Research.gov Team at the National Science Foundation