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Only a full-time faculty member or a full-time professional staff member may be named as the Principal Investigator on a research proposal. The following academic ranks constitute appointments to the faculty: instructor, assistant professor, associate professor, and professor. These appointments may be at the probationary or tenured level. Exceptions may be made to this policy based upon approval of a petition submitted to the Vice President for Research. The petition, which is submitted by the proposed Principal Investigator, must indicate endorsement or non-endorsement by the department faculty as evidenced by the Chairperson's signature, by the Dean, and by the Director of the Research Development & Compliance Office. A blank petition form can be found on the "Budget" section of the Research Administration website. Keep in mind that if you have multiple departments involved in your proposal, and F&A Cost is an allowable charge in your budget, you will need to discuss the distribution of the F&A Cost Return with these departments. It is also recommended that a memo or a signed agreement discussing the distribution of the F&A Cost Return is included with the proposal. An example of this memo can be found on the "Budget" section of the Research Administration website. The lead time policy for internal processing of grant proposals is five days. This means that five days prior to the due date of the proposal, a finalized version should be brought to Research Administration for review and the start of the signature process. You can sign up to receive an e-mail from Research Administration every two weeks containing the most recent medical-related grant proposal opportunities from the Community of Science website, the Grants.gov website, and the NSF website. If you are interested in this service, just e-mail Research Administration at cgraves@medicine.nodak.edu. As the PI of a grant project, you may be contacted by a Federal, State, or University auditor concerning expenses on your grant. When you receive these phone calls or e-mails, it is a good idea to direct that individual to myself for explanations and/or clarifications. If the auditor insists that a discussion with yourself and/or the department head is needed, I can then set up a meeting with all parties involved. If you have any questions or concerns, I can be reached by phone at 777-2808, or by e-mail at cgraves@medicine.nodak.edu. When a new grant project number is set up by the UND Grants & Contracts Administration Office, the PI of the project is mailed a copy of the award document and the UND Information Sheet. If you did not receive these documents, or have lost them, you can contact Research Administration at 777-2808 for a copy. UND policy states that if your grant project requires IRB approval, a grant project number (ex. UND0012345) will not be set up until the IRB approval has been obtained. On North Dakota Department of Human Services proposals, you are to use the full indirect cost rate if it will be awarded as a contract. If the proposal is to be awarded as a grant, the indirect cost is limited to 8%. Your proposal budget may ask for a "Cognizant Agency" for our Indirect Cost Rate Schedule. UND's "Cognizant Agency" is the US Department of Health & Human Services. Our Point of Contact is Robert W. Lee, and his phone number is (415) 437-7820. On a Grants.gov proposal application, each new application must have a different title from any other application with the same PD/PI. The title is found in the “Descriptive Title of Applicant’s Project” field (field #11 of the SF424 (R&R) form). By trying to get around the eRA Commons registration requirements and “borrowing” a PI Commons ID from a colleague, you will pass the Grants.gov and NIH system checks, but there is an NIH "Receipt and Referral" department that will catch this slight of type. Using the eRA Commons ID of a different individual will result in that individual being listed as the PD/PI for the grant application in the NIH data system and that individual will have access to the review outcome and summary statement. A PI’s Commons ID should be regarded as their NIH PIN number – it belongs to the Principal Investigator only! By submitting an application you are certifying that the contents are true, complete and accurate. Please plan ahead and get the necessary accounts in place prior to submission. With the big push to make research more collaborative and interdisciplinary, the number of subaward recipients we have to deal with is likely to grow. This means that the University and the PI will have to remain ever vigilant concerning our liabaility for anything that could go wrong at the end of the project. Federal and UND regulations require that conflict of interest forms be on file for principal investigators (PI) of proposals submitted to external funding agencies. UND has recently approved a new policy on conflict of interest. The policy and forms can be found on the Research Development & Compliance website. PIs must also submit a “Certification of Filing of Financial Interests Disclosure Statement” to the Division of Research annually, or more frequently if their status changes during the year. The UND Division of Research frequently provides matching funds for proposals to external funding agencies. In order to properly monitor the amounts and sources of matching funds provided for these proposals, principal investigators requesting matching funds must complete a “Division of Research Matching Funds Request Form,” which can be found on the Division of Research website. In order to ensure that correspondence from granting agencies is received by the Division of Research in a timely manner, please use the following e-mail address for Barry Milavetz, associate vice president for research, on all external grant proposals: rdc@mail.und.nodak.edu. Reviewing your "PI Report" monthly helps you verify your budget, expenses, and budget balance. If you are proposing a subcontract in your budget, you will need to receive a commitment letter, budget, budget justification, and scope of work from that entity before the proposal is submitted by UND. Once an employee receives his/her “Personnel Activity Confirmation” report, they have 30 days to review, sign, and return this report to Research Administration. It is very important to verify that your actual effort percentage on a grant project meets or exceed the effort percentage shown in the grant proposal. In 2005, NIH’s top audit problem areas included unallowable costs, improper allocation of costs (direct/indirect), spending down grant funds, improper cost transfers, and effort reporting. “Spending down” a sponsored project when it gets close to the end date of that project is strictly prohibited per Federal Circular A-110. F&A costs (indirect costs) are only charged on the first $25,000 of each subcontract, and are not charged on any equipment purchases $5,000 or above. Salary corrections are not allowed on an employee once that employee has certified to their time on their “Personnel Activity Confirmation” report. All UNDSMHS employees working on a grant project need to certify to their time. This certification is done by reviewing and signing a “Personnel Activity Confirmation” report which is sent to the employee semesterly by Research Administration. All externally sponsored proposals at the SMHS need to be reviewed and signed by the PI of the project, Research Administration, your department chairperson, the SMHS Associate Dean for Research, the SMHS Dean, and the UND Research Development & Compliance Office. These signatures are obtained on the “UNDSMHS Proposal Routing Form”. There is a process where a grant project number can be set up prior to the award document being received. If you are interested in this option, you can contact Corey at 777-2808. No-cost extension requests need to be reviewed by Research Administration and submitted by the Research Development & Compliance office. If you have any questions on these requests, you can contact Research Administration at 777-2808. When submitting an NIH proposal via Grants.gov, all attachments need to be in a PDF format. When submitting an NIH proposal via Grants.gov, you need to input the PI’s eRA Commons username in the box titled “Credential, e.g., agency login” on the Senior/Key Person Profile form. Expenses such as office supplies, line charges, postage, administrative salaries, memberships, food purchases, subcontracts, equipment, and faculty overload payments are considered unallowable on grants and contracts unless they are listed in the proposal budget and budget justification. When submitting an NIH proposal via Grants.gov, attachments should not include page numbers or headers. Once the proposal is received by NIH, headers and footers are automatically added.