Transcript The Evolution of WSU’s Sponsored Program Administration Office

PAD Seminar
February 2009
Top Ten Reasons to Befriend Your
Sponsored Program Administration
Office
• SPA is the institutional office responsible for
administrative oversight of WSU’s externally
sponsored research
• SPA combines the administrative and accounting
functions in a single office
• SPA can assist you through some of pitfalls that occur
in the conduct of externally sponsored research
• Or, ……
 Is this just a David Letterman bit to wrap up the week?
 But, what we really want to do ……
Today’s Objectives
 Discuss some of the critical, tricky, complex aspects of
sponsored program work
 Place a face with the name of a couple of SPA
personnel. Our panelists:
Karen Watkins-Hollowell
Patty Yuhas-Kieleszewski
Tim Foley
Jim Barbret
 Have you tell/ask us about issues which you have
encountered
 Open a very necessary dialogue if we are to be
successful in our initiatives!
The Sponsored Program Lifecycle
 The Lifecycle:
 The idea/hypothesis
 Find someone who will “pay for it”
 Develop a proposal
 Submit the proposal
 Get selected – YEAH!
 Execute an award
 Execute the project
 Close-out and wrap-up
 Problem areas can arise in any of these “phases”
Today’s Selected “Problem Zones”
 Budget Development: What costs do I include?
 Developing a Proposal: What does it look like?
 Submitting a Proposal: Who does what?
 Award Execution: The Award Documents
 Account Set-up: When do I get my account?
 Financial Management: Who and how do we manage
the finances?
 Subcontractors
 Cost Sharing
Budget Development: What costs
do I include?
 Salaries and Wages – time and effort of people who will be
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working on the grant, normally expressed in a percentage
of their time
Fringe Benefits – varying rates for the individuals named
above
Materials and Supplies – necessary to conduct the project
Travel – related to conduct and disseminate the research
Equipment – necessary to conduct the project
Facilities & Administrative Costs – indirect costs, overhead,
etc.
Developing a Proposal: What does
it look like?
 Sponsor will define, in most cases, what the proposal must
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cover
Federal agencies are pretty standard, RR424
State agencies have their own format
Foundations and associations are unique, Proposal Central
Industry is … whatever they like
 KEY CONCEPT – read and follow the instructions
Submitting a Proposal: Who does
what?
 The final “packet” is developed by the PI and their staff
 Specific approvals must be obtained prior to submission
 “Internal” approvals – Chairs, Deans, IRB’s
 “Proposal” approvals – Business official, Institutional Official
 SPA, as institutional official, is last in the approval process
 Who presses the button? Drops it in the mailbox? Hands
off to FedEx? – Differs based sponsor requirements
 KEY CONCEPT – Timing, timing, timing
Award Execution: The Award
Documents
 Varied award vehicles:
 Grant – unilateral vs. accepted
 Contract – legal document requiring review, formal execution
 Memorandum of Understanding – looks a lot like a contract
 The Vice President of Research, delegated to SPA, has
signature authority
 SPA is the official University repository
 KEY CONCEPT - SPA needs to receive and process the
award
Account Set-up: When do I get my
account?
 When award is processed, SPA will establish an account
with budget
 PI’s are notified via e-mail of their index/fund number –
GFA
 Indexes are open for the period of the authorization
 Multiple indexes may be requested to indentify separate
budget components, ie phases or tasks
 KEY CONCEPT – Indexes can be requested prior to receipt
of award if work is going to begin
Financial Management: Who and
how do we manage the finances?
 Most awards have some level of budget restriction – this is not a gift
 A budget will be established that defines a baseline plan
 Changes and deviations are allowable
 Depending on the level of change, sponsor approval may be required –
coordinate with SPA
 Department and PI are primarily responsible for processing if all
expense documents
 SPA handles the revenue side
 KEY CONCEPT – Financial management begins Day One,
not at closeout
Cost Sharing
 Whenever there is a cost that the sponsor does not pay for,
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there is cost sharing
Cost sharing may be mandated by sponsor/program
guidelines
When cost sharing is required, you should be careful to
meet, not exceed, the requirement
Common Forms of Costs– Personnel, equipment
“In-Kind – comes from a third party, a non-WSU source
Watch out for the terminology, “leverage”, “matching” etc.
Cost Sharing
 During Proposal Development, identify cost sharing items
 Think about how the cost can be documented
 Determine how these will be funded, and get approval
 When awarded, a second account gets established to
capture cost share transactions
 Cost share costs are real
 KEY CONCEPT - Construct a full budget, then determine
what should be cost shared
Subcontractors
 Not all collaborators are subcontractors
 A sub-contractor (an entity WSU will pay) needs top treat
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us as their sponsor
They should submit to WSU just as they would submit to
an agency
Components – budget, statement of work, institutional
authorization
Upon award to WSU, SPA will generate an agreement with
subcontractor
Invoices should go to SPA, who processes payments
SPA coordinates with PI/staff
Questions & Answers
 About the topics we covered …
 Any topics …
 Thank you