Office of Research and Project Administration

Below is the most recent information ORPA has received with respect to how the National Science Foundation plans to dispense their stimulus funding. 

Should your faculty be contacted directly about a previously declined proposal that is now being considered for funding, please notify your ORPA Research Administrator.

We will notify the research community as soon as the specific MRI program announcement is posted.

As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to contact your ORPA RA:

Donna Beyea - x 5-8037

Anne Corriveau - x 3-2137

Gayle Elledge - x 5-1502

Brenda Kavanaugh - x 5-1504

Tammie Martin - x 3-3960

Jane Tolbert - x 5-4210

Cheryl Williams - x 5-1503

The NSF Director has released Important Notice 131 announcing information on how NSF will spend the $3 billion provided under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The Notice is available at www.nsf.gov/recovery . The Notice states that NSF has developed policies, procedures, and Frequently Asked Questions for use by the awardee community, that will soon be posted to its Recovery Act web site.
The information in the Notice echoes the description provided by Joanna Rom, NSF Deputy Director for Budget, Finance and Award Management, at the February COGR meeting.

Highlights include:

 NSF currently has many highly rated proposals that it has not been able to fund.  For this reason, NSF is planning to use the majority of the $2 billion available in Research and Related Activities for proposals that are already in house and will be reviewed and/or awarded prior to September 30, 2009. 

> All grants issued with Recovery Act funds will be standard grants with durations of up to 5 years.
> Funding of new Principal Investigators and high-risk, high-return research will be top priorities.

With the exception of the MRI, ARI and Science Masters programs, the majority of proposals eligible for Recovery Act funding include those that are already in house at NSF and will be reviewed and/or awarded prior to September 30, 2009. 

NSF also will consider proposals declined on or after October 1, 2008.  The reversal of the decision to decline must be based on both the high quality of the reviews received on the initial submission and the lack of available funding at the time the original decision was made.  The cognizant program officer will contact the institution when a reversal is being considered by NSF.

NSF will post a solicitation this spring for the Major Research Instrumentation Program (MRI). The Foundation currently anticipates that no other solicitations will be posted that are solely in response to the Recovery Act.

 Awardees will be informed that they are expected to expend funds in a timely manner on allowable award costs and that NSF will be monitoring awards for expenditures.  If, after 12 months, no allowable expenditures have taken place, NSF may consider reducing or terminating the award and reallocating the funds.
 
Carol J. Blum
Director
Research Compliance and Adminstration
Council on Governmental Relations (COGR)
202-289-6655, ext. 17
(Fax: 202-289-6698)
cblum@cogr.edu