external funding and collaboration nsf teacher enhancement summer institute champaign, illinois july...
TRANSCRIPT
External Funding and Collaboration
NSF Teacher Enhancement
Summer Institute
Champaign, IllinoisJuly 2002
What we’ll cover
• Terminology
• Who should write collaborative proposals
• Essential proposal elements
• Success proposal generation
• Successful proposal implementation
Terminology
• PI – principal investigator• Co-PI – co-principal investigator• Grant – usually involves research, no strict
deliverables• Contract – usually are concrete, specific deliverables• Program officer – funding agency point of contact,
provider of information, review panel organizer• Review panel – meeting of individuals selected to
represent different points of view who will critique submitted proposals
Terminology (cont’d)
• Preproposal – draft proposal submission that outlines the general proposal idea and rough budget. Feedback should be provided on the pre-proposal before submission of the final proposal
• Full/Final proposal – final proposal submission containing all required proposal elements and a final (committed) budget
Terminology (cont’d)
• Proposal negotiation – discussion between review panel decision and award to determine if the proposal can be changed in response to the review panel’s suggestions and be within a target budget determined by the program officer. To the proposers advantage to finish this step FAST.
Terminology
• Cost sharing – amount of money/resources required by funding agency to be provided by the proposing institution– “In-kind” is common– Personnel time is common– Cash is rare
Who should organize collaborative proposals
• Characteristics of good proposal leaders– Energetic – Type A– Idea generator– Compromiser– Consensus builder– Writing skills– Organizational skills– Patience – Type B
What the proposal organizer should bring to the table
• Institutional strengths
• Personal connections with peers and organizations in the field
• Past experience and successful performance on previous grants (track record)
• Personal credibility to funding agency
Becoming a proposal organizer
• Becoming a proposal organizer is a chicken and egg problem– Critical elements come from successful proposals
– First time prospective PIs don’t have a track record
• Solution – become attached to a mentor who has been through this before
• Caution – there are a lot of people who have “been through this before” and do it wrong
Levels of responsibility
• Key personnel– PI– Co-PI– Senior scientist
• Unnamed contributor– General expertise
Responsibilities
• Institution’s Office of Grants and Contracts (or Office of Sponsored Programs or …)– Institutional signatures
– Proposal submission approval
– Subcontract generation and approval
– Changes to award
– Requesting award funding from funding agency
– Distributing award funding to appropriate institution budget line
Responsibilities
• PI– Technical/funding scontact for the funding agency– Leader for management and implementation of award– Approval for charges against the award including
subcontracts– Responsible for cost sharing accounting– Periodic reports to funding agency– Management of award– Recipient of a percentage of the overhead collected– Answer questions from funding agency
Responsibility
• Co-PI– Role defined by the PI and the proposal– If at an institution different than the PI, will be
funded by subcontract from the PI’s institution– Usually receives (at least partial) credit from
own institution for funding received– At universities, at least, receive partial
remittance of overheads collected along with PI
Essential Proposal Elements
• Funding opportunity identification• Collaborators• Proposal generation• Proposal outline• Budget• Submission• Reviews returned• Debriefing for proposal
Opportunity Identification
• What are you interested in doing (interest drives proposals not vice-versa)?– Subject area– Possible partners– Outcomes– Ballpark funding required– Possible cost sharing available– Resources available
Exercise
• Create a MS Word document
• Make a list of the opportunity identification elements on the previous slide for a proposal you are interested in
Funding Opportunity Identification
• Compile a list of funding sponsors
• Starting points– Government agencies– State agencies– Industry– Foundations– Your own institution
Funding Opportunity Identification
• Government agencies– Know the politics
• http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/education
• http://www.nochildleftbehind.gov/
– National Science Foundation www.nsf.gov• http://www.ehr.nsf.gov/ehr/esie/ (ESIE program website)
– Department of Education www.ed.gov• http://www.ed.gov/index.jsp (Grants)
– Department of Energy http://www.energy.gov
NSF Opportunities
• Instructional Materials Development (NSF 02-067)
• Centers for Learning and Teaching (NSF 02-038)
• Informal Education (NSF 0160)
Department of Education
• Go to Department of Education web site
• Click on “Grants and Contracts” tab
Funding Opportunity Identification
• State agencies– State department of public instruction
• E.g. North Carolina http://www.dpi.state.nc.us/
• Use search function on keywords like “grants” or “funding”
Funding Opportunity Identification
• Industry– Intel http://www97.intel.com/education/index.asp
• Intel National and Community Grants– http://www.intel.com/education/sections/corporate3/index
.htm
• Matching Gifts/Volunteer Matching Grants Program
– Microsoft http://www.microsoft.com/giving/
Funding Opportunity Identification
• Foundation– Generally on the web
– Books of foundations
– Generally every large corporation has a foundation• Intel (www.intel.com)
• Compaq (www.compaq.com)
• Microsoft (www.microsoft.com)
• Burroughs Wellcome Fund– http://www.bwfund.org/science_education.htm
Funding Opportunity Identification
• Foundations– http://fdncenter.org/
• Search by keyword
• Search by state
• Grant maker search 3.0
Exercise
• Find one government and one foundation funding source that might satisfy your requirements
Opportunity Identification
• Narrowing the list of possibilities– Determine return on investment (include
overhead time for grant administration)– Make sure it is something you want to do
• Optimally the project is something you were going to do anyway
• Minimally it should not be distracting
• Chasing money for the sake of funding is counterproductive
Opportunity Identification
• Meet with the Program Officer (or minimally arrange a telephone call)– Take a one page white paper of what you think
will respond to the opportunity solicitation– Take a folder of information about your
institution targeted to the opportunity
Opportunity Identification
• White paper sections– Project Summary– Project description
• Background• Needs• Project Partners• Goals• Outcomes• Project Design• Technology Plan• Work Plan• Evaluation Plan• Dissemination Plan
Opportunity Identification
• Agenda for Program Officer meeting– Provide overview of your institution– Request a solicitation overview – Discuss the one page white paper and whether it responds
favorably to the solicitation– Receive pointers from the Program Officer about white paper
changes– Ask Program Officer about other proposals that have been
funded that are similar to the white paper– Establish a relationship with the Program Officer that will
enable follow-up email and subsequent visits– Take good notes!
Opportunity Identification
• Realistically assess chances of winning– Raw probability
• Ask Program Officer how many proposals submitted last round and number of winners
– Better estimate• Experience
• Budget
• Meet expectations of solicitation
• Competitors
• Comparison to previous winning proposals
Opportunity Identification
• Revise white paper• Send to Program Officer for comments or review
changes by telephone• Use the white paper to solicit partners• Send the white paper to your Grants Office to
keep them in the loop– Receive feedback, if any– Receive institutional experience about the funding
agency (success of others, pitfalls)
Exercise
• Go around the room and assess the probability of success of a proposal for the funding source identified
Collaboration
• Breakdown the solicitation into subject areas
• Ensure there are collaborators with credentials in each subject area
• Utilize “networking” to find potential collaborators
• Ask Program Officer for potential collaborators
Collaboration
• Establishing collaboration– One approach is to have a meeting with all
potential collaborators identified– Determine theme for proposal based on
solicitation– Identify how each collaborator supports the
theme– Identify role of each collaborator– Identify benefits to each collaborator
Collaboration
• Pitfalls– Identification of the PI, co-PIs, senior scientists
and unidentified collaborators. All must be engaged
– Collaborators who are “too busy” – Not establishing a strong probability of success
for this proposal and the collaborators– Budget
Proposal Generation
• Two primary jobs– Content Leader (usually the PI)
• Responsible for content in the proposal
• Defining roles of collaborators, adding collaborators, removing collaborators
• Deciding on budget
• Assigning writing assignments
• Establishing milestone dates
Proposal Generation
– Logistics Leader• Forms
• Creating proposal drafts from submitted text
• Enforcing proposal generation timelines
• Calling funding agency to resolve logistical problems
• Calling collaborators
• Interfacing with Grants and Contracts
Proposal Generation
• Secondary roles– Content section chairs– Individual contributors– Technical writer– Proof reader
Proposal Generation
• Steps (6 months to complete)– White Paper– White Paper revised– Pre-proposal (short version of full proposal) and rough
budget– 1st draft full proposal– 2nd draft full proposal and 1st draft budget– 3rd draft full proposal and 2nd draft budget– Final full proposal and final budget– Signed institutional commitments
Proposal Outline
• Cover sheet and forms• Project summary• Project description
– Background– Need– Project Partners and Roles– Goals and Objectives– Outcomes
Proposal Outline
• Project Description (cont’d)– Project Design– Technology Plan– Work Plan– Project Management– Key Personnel– Advisory Committee– Evaluation Plan– Dissemination Plan– Institutionalization
Proposal Outline
• Institutional Resources Available• Bibliography• Biographical Sketches• Budget
– PI institution– Subcontracts
• Current and Pending Support (NSF)• Project Data Sheet (NSF)• Letters of Support
Budget
• Every funding agency has its own form• Generates most of the disagreements after award• Can be fatal to the project if miscalculated• Has the potential to be audited during the project
and after project completion• Cost sharing can be underestimated but better not
be overestimated• Required cost sharing can range from 0% to 50%
Budget
• Proposal submission requires institutional signature
• Engage Grants and Contracts early in the budget process – they can be your best friend or worst enemy
• Determine budget expectations of the funding agency early
Budget
• Budget justification– Shows how you arrived at the numbers you show
– Reviewers key in on certain aspects of the budget• Amount of funding provided directly to teachers
• Amount of funding for subcontracts
• Amount of funding for “overhead” expenses
– Make sure anticipated expenditures are allowable
Budget
• Cost Sharing– Pre-award costs incurred usually don’t count
• NSF has a 90 day rule for costs incurred prior to award
– In-kind as well as cash allowed (fair value)– Personnel costs are popular– Cash is unpopular
Budget
• If budget is not competitive, try:– Negotiate with your institution on indirect costs– Increase cost sharing– Decrease scope of work and decrease cost– Increase economies of scale– Leverage previous work– Decrease level (and cost) of personnel involved
Submission
• Requirements– Cover letter – official transmittal– Proposal – usually several copies required
• Font size• Margin requirements• Section lengths
– Signatures – gathering PI/co-PI signatures tricky for multi-institutional proposals
– On-time delivery – crucial!!!
Submission
• Plan ahead– Know what must be done the last week– Make emergency plans
• Editing
• Photocopying
• Delivery
– Parallelize tasks as much as feasible
NSF Helpful Hints
• Register your school district NOW with FastLane
• Register as a PI or co-PI NOW – you never know when you’ll need it
Review Panel/Evaluation
• Review Panel– Diverse set of content experts to review the proposal
according to the solicitation guidelines
– Proposal must address critical items in solicitation
– Proposal must be “cost effective”
– Written review(s) done by panel and provided to PI
– Recommends funding or no funding
– Program Officer is the point for the final decision
– Budget and scope negotiation after review
Reviews
• Provided to PI• Contains strengths, weaknesses and
recommendation• Blueprint for resubmission if proposal declined for
funding– However a different panel will most likely review a
subsequent proposal– There are no guarantees in life
• Panel dynamics can affect the proposal evaluation
Debriefing
• Debriefing strongly recommended whether the proposal is funded or not
• Will help to establish better relationship with Program Officer
• Will provide insight into program requirements• Program Officer can describe the “ambience” in
the room and not just the conclusions• A face-to-face meeting with the Program Officer
will yield the best information
Proposal Implementation
• Get a fast start – even before formal award
• Subcontract generation is usually the biggest problem– Work should start even before subcontracts are
completed– Tight subcontracts are needed in case of trouble– Most institutions have standard language for
this
Proposal Implementation
• Set up meeting dates a year at a time
• Establish a web presence and reserve URLs
• Visit the Program Officer as soon as possible after award for formal debriefing and to show start-up progress
Proposal Implementation
• Communicate with Program Officer on a quarterly basis– Quality quarterly reports will set you out from
the other winning proposals – quarterly visits will really set you apart
– Submit all required reports on time• Affects subsequent proposals
– Communicate program changes to Program Officer and keep a written record of notification
Bias
• Hiring proposal writers isn’t helpful unless expertise transfer occurs– Need expertise in own organization– Writing is only part of the game– Success is strongly influenced by the content
• Proposal writing can’t be an “as time allows” activity
General Helpful hints
• Never start a proposal with less than 3 months to the pre-proposal or full proposal submission deadline– My personal limit is 6 months
• Scale the effort required to the expected reward– Small award amounts should take small amount of time
• For new solicitations, the proposal organizer should know the solicitation is going to be released before it is released
• Give calls from funding agencies highest priority
Summary
• Flowchart (ahhh, a programming term) of how to create and submit successful proposals
• There is no one “right” way to do this
• Proposal writing is a stressful experience
• Success (or “hit”) ratio is important
• Reward vs. effort is important