OGC-103 Grant Proposal Documents Deadlines

Purpose

This policy establishes a deadline for the preparation, completion, and receipt by OGC of required grant documents in the proposal development process. Strict adherence to these deadlines is necessary for OGC staff to have adequate time to prepare and review grant documents and be able to service faculty in an organized and efficient manner.

Scope

This policy applies to all eligible College of Agricultural Sciences Principal Investigators (PI) and Co-PIs, per Penn State policy RA03, who plan to seek extramural funding, including new proposals, preproposals, subawards, supplements, continuations, renewals, resubmissions, and any other forms of added funding. The deadlines outlined in this policy apply to the proposal development process, which begins upon receipt and advancement of a Notice of Intent per OGC-102. Included in this are grants that require OGC submission but may have been developed with help from other offices such as, but not limited to the Office of Foundation Relations and/or Corporate Engagement.

It is a violation of Penn State policy RA20 Proposal Submission for principal investigators to submit proposals on their own and without the authorization of the Penn State Authorized Organizational Representative (AOR).

Prerequisites

The proposal development process (see Definitions below) will vary by sponsor (see Definitions below) and program. Therefore, all prerequisites for this policy are dependent on the specific solicitation for funding.

Responsibilities

The PI is responsible for sending all required documents, in complete form, to the OGC pre-award Proposal and Awards Generalist (PAG) by the deadlines outlined in this policy. Some departments may have a PAG to assist the PI in collecting these documents.

The OGC pre-award PAG will review received documents for errors and compliance with sponsor regulations per the sponsor guidelines. The OGC PAG will initiate the Internal Award Form (IAF) through the Office for Sponsored Programs (OSP). The PAG will return documents to the PI and department PAG (if applicable) for corrections. The OGC PAG is responsible for recommending to the AOR submission of proposals that are complete and compliant with sponsor and PSU policies.

Definitions

The proposal development process includes all pre-award work (e.g., the review of the solicitation, the establishment of the timeline for the preparation of documents required by a sponsor, gathering the necessary approvals, development of budgets, the submission of the proposal, and other pre-award work as necessary).

The sponsor is the organization funding the grant.

A subaward is a legally binding agreement between two entities and funded from grant or contract funds.

Policy

Minimum of Two Weeks Prior to the Sponsor Deadline:

PIs are responsible to ensure that OGC is in receipt of all grant documents in final form (except for the final technical narrative, abstract, and references/bibliography) two weeks prior to the grant deadline.

Examples of documents in final form typically include but are not limited to: detailed SIMs budget with budget justification, approved Grant-in-Aid (GIA)/Graduate Assistant (GA) requests, Facilities & Administration (F&A) documentation and justifications for waiver requests, cost share approvals, logic models, biosketches, complete and final subaward documents, current and pending support, conflict of interest, facilities and other resources, data management plans, mentoring plans, etc.

Subaward/Subcontract Documents: The subaward documents listed below must be complete and in final form for the PI to complete their own budget and justification for the two-week internal deadline. In order to meet this deadline, PIs should obtain final subaward documents at least three weeks before the sponsor deadline.

At a minimum, subawardees must supply a budget, justification, detailed scope of work, biosketches, current/pending support for key personnel, and a letter of intent signed by their Authorized Official. If a sponsor has specific budget forms or other applicable forms that are part of the grant application, the subawardee must complete those too. These documents are to be final and sent as part of the overall application package to OGC no later than two weeks prior to the sponsor deadline.

Documents that are not sent to OGC in final form at least two weeks prior to the sponsor deadline may result in a suspension of proposal development and the grant proposal may not be completed and submitted.

Minimum of Three Business Days Prior to the Sponsor Deadline:

The PI will send the final proposal narrative, abstract and bibliography to the OGC PAG.

Documents submitted outside of the deadlines established by this policy will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis as determined by OGC leadership.

Procedure

The PI and/or unit PAG will send each document via email to the OGC PAG in two formats, both as Microsoft Word and a PDF file. Documents sent to the OGC are expected to be “submission ready” and in compliance with sponsor, University, and college regulations. Changes will not be made to these documents except to correct errors and/or bring them into compliance with sponsor regulations and requirements for proposal submission.

The OGC PAG will review documents as soon as possible. They will make recommendations for changes to the PI and return the document(s) to the PI for editing. Changes that are needed for compliance reasons are mandatory. The OGC PAG adds final grant documents and prepares the grant application package as dictated by the RFA or other sponsor instructions. Upon completing the application kit and receipt of an approved IAF through OSP, the grant proposal will be approved for submission to the sponsor.

Please note that there will be some situations where the sponsor requires the PI to set up an individual, password protected account for grant preparation. In such cases, the PI may be the person to upload and complete the online application.

References

• RA03 - Eligibility to Serve as a Principle Investigator
• RA20 - Proposal Submission
• OGC-102 Internal Notice of Intent Deadlines
• OGC Online Notice of Intent Form
• OGC-104 Alternative Proposal Submission Option

Download OGC-103 Grant Proposal Documents Deadlines