Medical School Information on the ORSP Proposal Submission Deadline Policy

The Office of Research & Sponsored Projects (ORSP) has announced the ORSP Deadline Policy coming January 6, 2020. In preparation, we would like to take a few minutes to underscore the highlights of their policy, implementation at the Medical School, and further information coming.

We are providing the school implementation plan so that departments may formulate an individual approach on handling proposals to meet campus and school expectations.

Highlights of the ORSP Deadline Policy (in effect January, 2020)

• ORSP will provide a Full or Limited review based on when they receive a Dean’s Office signed and finalized application. (Received >4 day = full, <4 days = limited). 
• ORSP requires all proposals to be approved by the Dean’s Office and finalized in the eRPM system a minimum of 15 business hours before the deadline. 
• If a project is finalized or school approved less than 15 business hours before the deadline, the proposal will be considered “At Risk”. ORSP will strive to submit, but only after the Limited review is completed. If they do not have time to complete the Limited review, the proposal will not be submitted.

Please keep in mind, the ORSP Deadline Policy will apply to projects due to a sponsor on a specific date.  This policy will not include those that have target submission dates with flexibility.

IMPLEMENTATION AT THE MEDICAL SCHOOL

The Grant Services & Analysis Office will not be changing our long-standing requested deadline for Medical School submissions. We have, though, restated the policy to be inclusive of ORSP’s requested time. Receiving proposals, whether administrative shell or finalized, 10 business days prior to the sponsor’s deadline will provide our office the established seven working days for Medical School review and also include the ORSP four days required for Full review. For those projects that arrive at the Medical School less than 10 business days prior to the sponsor deadline, we will continue to handle and review in the order received, but will not be able to guarantee meeting a specific service level in the ORSP policy, which could cause the submission to fall into ORSP’s Limited or “At Risk” categories.

By continuing to accept and approve administrative shells, we intend to provide investigators as much time as possible to finalize the scientific portions of the submission. This approach will work if there are no changes to the administrative shell after our approval.

Additionally, we have reached agreement with campus on handling proposals we submit directly to federal sponsors for our faculty. In these instances, when we are acting on behalf of ORSP, we will be evaluated as compliant based solely on the date finalized, even if the approval has not been completed. This way, all projects will have the same finalization expectation regardless of which office is handling the submission.

WHAT CAN YOU DO NOW?

Reset your internal clock! PIs and Project Teams need to start transitioning the mindset to finalizing proposals more than 15 business hours before a deadline. As an example, for the February 5 deadline, you would want to adjust and finalize no later than 9AM on February 4.  (Even earlier is highly recommended!)  

We currently have many submissions that finalize on the last day of a deadline. If that continues in 2020, it may cause ORSP to evaluate whether an even more stringent deadline policy is needed. Throughout the Fall, we will be carefully monitoring and sharing data with departments on timing related to routing and finalization in order to help inform the conversation and provide information to help target those PIs and Project Teams that may need additional support.

The two items to work on over the summer are: decide and educate! Individual departments will begin review of their unit’s submission policies to bring them in line with ORSP and the Medical School. And departments will share those expectations with faculty and staff. This summer is a perfect time for conversations within departments about the importance of routing on time and the target dates to finalize proposals.  

WHAT IS COMING?

On July 22, campus will be releasing a new version of the PAF that will offer fields to distinguish target submission dates from sponsor deadlines. We will work with the Research Administration community to fully explain the definitions and implications of using each field.

In the Fall, we will provide additional information on routing/state changes that will be introduced in eRPM January 2020 with the implementation of the ORSP Deadline Policy.  This will help you best prepare for system changes.

QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS?

Please reach out to the Grant Services & Analysis Office (msgrants@umich.edu) with your questions and concerns. We would like to make the transition as transparent and easy as possible. We value your feedback that we may share with campus or use to further enhance our services within the Medical School to make the ORSP Deadline Policy implementation seamless.