Proposal Development

It takes time and effort to develop a successful proposal — in fact, proposal success rates average 20–33%, depending on the field. Funding agencies reject half the proposals they receive because the applicant did not follow instructions or the proposal did not match the funding program.

However, the rewards for garnering research funding can be great, enabling you to explore new frontiers, instruct your students in the conduct of research, and yield new discoveries and knowledge of benefit to society. Use these resource to get started.

 

Award Setup

After receipt of a new sponsored award or continuation from a sponsor, the Research Office will prepare the award for spending. We work with departments and PIs to finalize project budgets, setup backend access and prepare your award to.

Setting up your files at the beginning of an award will help to keep you organized throughout the life of the award and make close-outs and audits a much simpler task. You may find it useful to set up a PROJECT ID folder to track transactions. Subfolders for each budget category or type of transaction allow you to further organize your transaction backup documentation.

When a new purpose is set up by the Research Office for a new project, a copy of the Research Office Chart of Accounts Notification is sent to the PI and department account administrator or department representative (this varies by department). This document is a valuable resource for you to retain to help you in administering your award. The Purpose, Project, Contract, and Proposal IDs are all listed. You will need these IDs to run queries and track your transactions. Validate the accuracy of this report and discuss any discrepancies with the Research Office.

 

Award Management

The University of Delaware is committed to supporting efficient and compliant award management. It is a shared responsibility of the PI, department, college and core offices to ensure that the award is set up in a manner to best support understanding of award conditions and University policies, meet sponsor expectations for deliverables and prior approvals, and meet financial controls and reporting requirements of the Sponsor.

Each award has unique terms and conditions and the best way to manage an award is to understand the requirements for each.

All federal sponsored awards and many non-governmental sponsors and University policy are based on 2 CFR 200, otherwise known as Uniform Guidance or the UG. These rules are the fundamental basis for most sponsored projects requirements in place at UF.

Many Federal Grants fall under the “Research Terms and Conditions”. Your award will specifically identify if it falls under the Research Terms and Conditions. These conditions provide additional flexibility to UF.

Award Transfer

The two main considerations when transferring to another institution are whether the investigator’s funded projects remain at the University under the direction of a new investigator, or whether the funding is transferred to the new institution where the project is then continued. As all sponsored funding is formally awarded to the University and not to the PI, the University must be involved in any decision to transfer funding to another institution.

Investigators who resign from the University of Delaware have several options to consider if they have sponsored funding.

In addition, new faculty coming to University of Delaware who intend to continue their active sponsored research will have similar considerations.

It is very important to contact your Research Office as soon as possible to discuss these considerations and next steps to ensure a smooth transition.

Award Closeout

The last step in a grant or contract’s life cycle, whether cost reimbursable or fixed price, is project closeout. The key feature to any closeout is the on-time submission of all technical, financial, and other required reports to the sponsor.

On-Time Reporting

Typically final reports of federal awards are due no later than 90 days after the expiration date of the award. Final reports for NSF and NIH awards are due 120 days after the expiration date of the award.

For non-federal awards (i.e. state, industry, non-profits), the closing procedures vary, depending on the policies of the sponsor. Most often, final reports have a shorter timeline than the federal rule.

Guides and Grant Resources

This information is designed to assist departmental research administrators — professionals who work with researchers in their unit and with contract-and-grant experts in the Research Office in establishing, maintaining, and closing out research awards. If you are seeking guidance on developing a proposal and its budget, please see the Proposal Guide.

 

Effort Admiministration

Effort Certification is defined as the reporting and confirmation of an employee’s time spent conducting any University activity, expressed as a percentage of the total institutional compensated based time — Institutional Based Salary (IBS). The University of Delaware has an online Effort Certification System. Training documents related to Effort and the Effort Certification System are available here.

Employees must review, and if correct, certify their total effort on all sponsored projects for each effort-reporting period. Effort supporting a sponsored project but not funded by the sponsor is considered cost share. Please see the University’s effort reporting policy and procedures here for detailed explanations and instructions.

UD's research enterprise depends on funding from federal and state agencies, private foundations, organizations, and industry. The University's electronic Effort Certification System is the principal means of verifying that salaries and wages charged to or contributed to a sponsored project are fulfilled in a manner consistent with the award documentation and compliant with the federal regulations for which the University is held accountable.

If you need assistance in identifying your effort administrator, please see the Department Administrator Directory within our Staff Directory. To learn more about administering the effort certification process in your department, check out these training opportunities.

  Effort Reporting Policy and Procedures Effort Reporting System
Effort Training Material Effort Online Training Material

Billing

Billing to sponsors and cash received from sponsors is handled by the Research Office. Cash and Billing transactions can be viewed in the Financials queries. It is important to note that cash received prior to the Grants and Billing modules going live in July 2004 is reflected differently than cash that has been received after 7/1/2004. To view all cash received for a Project, it may be necessary to run all three cash queries to get a total.

GMQ_CASH_NOT_PS_BILL Cash received outside of PS Billing — This query gives all Cash received outside of the Billing module.

GMQ_CASH_PS_BILLED Sum of PS billing activity — This query gives you all Cash received as a result of a Billing in PS module.

GMQ_CASH_THRU_2002 Total Cash as of 7/1/02 — This query gives you a total of all cash received prior to 7/1/02 (prior to Financials go-live date).

 

 

Cost-Share

Cost-share is defined as funds committed for the project that are not budgeted from grant funds. Some examples include equipment, personnel effort, and tuition. If there are cost-share commitments, contact the departments or colleges that have committed funds. Some cost-share will require companion Purposes; others may be tracked using cost-share Speedtypes or UD Userfields. We will go into more detail on different ways to track cost-share transactions in the section on Maintaining Your Award. The cost share policy can be found here. If the cost-share is from a third party, contact the source and outline requirements for documentation so that you can report these transactions along with the internal cost-share expenses. Specific guidance on cost-sharing in relation to federal grants is in the OMB Circular A-110, Subpart C.23 or UG Subpart D.