NSF new requirements
College information for addressing them
Data Management Plans: Special Information and Supplementary
Documentation, contains a clarification of NSF’s long standing data
policy. All proposals must describe plans for data management and
sharing of the products of research, or assert the absence of the need
for such plans. Fastlane will not permit submission of a proposal
that is missing a Data Management Plan. Cross-references are
included in the Project Description section (II.C.2.d), the Results
from Prior NSF Support (II.C.2.d(iii)), Proposals for Conferences,
Symposia and Workshops (II.D.8), and the Proposal Preparation
Checklist (Exhibit II-1). The Data Management Plan will be
reviewed as part of the intellectual merit or broader impacts of the
proposal or both. Effective for all new NSF applications submitted to
NSF on and after January 18th, 2011
The College IT and Research Office in collaboration with DRDA have
developed a template for use when providing a data management plan
(DMP) to NSF. Your DMP should be shared with local IT Manager/Staff
or the LSA Computer Support Group (LSA-CSG@umich.edu ) for help
with the details and implementation of the required DMP so that we can
ensure compliance. You’ll find the template and relevant materials at
either the LSA Faculty Toolkit or the RA Toolkit on the LSA Research
Website.
http://lsa.umich.edu/research/resources/facultytoolkit
http://lsa.umich.edu/research/resources/admintoolkit
Cost Sharing, has been revised to implement the National Science
Board’s recommendations regarding cost sharing. Inclusion of
voluntary committed cost sharing is prohibited, Awardees are
informed, however, that they remain subject to the OMB A-21
Clarification memo regarding committing and tracking faculty effort
(see footnote 22). In order to assess the scope of the project, all
organizational resources necessary for the project must be described
in the Facilities, Equipment and Other Resources section (II.C.2.i).
The description should be narrative in nature and must not include
any quantifiable financial information. ---Mandatory cost sharing
will only be required when explicitly authorized by the NSF
Director. This new guideline will apply for all NSF proposal
received on or after January 18th, 2011.
The College does consider requests for non-mandatory voluntary cost
sharing on a case-by-case basis. Please see the College's policy on cost
sharing http://lsa.umich.edu/research/funding/sources/cost-sharing .
If non-mandatory cost sharing, including personnel costs, is included in
the NSF project please put that information in the sponsor’s Facilities
and Resources section (not in the budget or justification). The
description should be narrative in nature and must not include any
quantifiable financial information. This non-mandatory cost sharing
commitment should be put on the PAF in the cost sharing section. If
this cost sharing includes commitments from the College and/or OVPR
be sure to upload the eGIF approval into eRPM.
Responsible Conduct of Research: The AOR is required to complete
a certification that the institution has a plan to provide appropriate
training and oversight in the responsible and ethical conduct of
research to undergraduates, graduate students, and postdoctoral
researchers who will be supported by NSF to conduct research.
Additional information on NSF’s RCR policy is available in the
AAG, Chapter IV.B. While training plans are not required to be
included in proposals submitted to NSF, institutions are advised that
they are subject to review upon request. This certification, and the
associated award condition, apply only to full proposals that were
submitted or due, on or after January 4, 2010.
Rackham and OVPR have put together a task force to develop a University
approach to the NSF requirement (you’ll remember that LSA rolled out an
interim plan earlier in the year).
LSA, after consultation with C&Ds, is developing a one-credit course for Fall
2011 for units that don't already have a course to fulfill the requirement in
keeping with the Rackham/OVPR Task Force recommendations. In addition to
this coursework, on-line training (under development) will also be required.
Until Fall of 2011 we will continue to follow the interim plan we distributed
earlier this year which I’ve inserted here: All LSA undergraduate students,
graduate students, and postdoctoral researchers participating in Federallysupported research projects are required to complete the PEERRS module
"Foundation of Good Research Practices" and pass the test with a minimum
grade of 80%. In addition, Federally-supported graduate students, and
postdoctoral researchers are required to complete the "Authorship, Publication,
and Peer Review" PEERRS module. Please note that the U-M plans to continue
to enhance the online RCR training programs over the next year to provide
additional training options and improve linkages to U-M resources such as the
PLAN: Profession, Life, Academics, Network
(http://www.rackham.umich.edu/plan/).
You can access information about PEERRS training completion on the LSA
MRS Research site called “PEERRS Certification Lookup”