MEMORANDUM TO School Of Medicine Faculty CC School Of

memorandum to: school of medicine faculty cc: school of medicine business administrators from: glen n. gaulton, ph.d. date: april 16,

MEMORANDUM
TO: School of Medicine Faculty
CC: School of Medicine Business Administrators
FROM: Glen N. Gaulton, Ph.D.
DATE: April 16, 2009
SUBJECT: Electronic Submission Deadlines
Although I hesitate to write to you at this time, as I know that you
are actively developing proposals for the upcoming NIH stimulus
deadlines, my administrative responsibilities dictate otherwise - so
please bear with me. Many of us have already utilized the PennERA
Proposal Development (PD) system for “system-to-system” grant
submissions at NIH; nevertheless, even we can be reminded that
e-submission is nothing like the old days when mailing the grant
signaled the end of the process. Therefore, as we approach a series of
pending NIH deadlines please keep the following points and
expectations in mind.
*
It is important to enter new proposals into the PD system as early
in the process as possible so that the School and University can
plan for e-submission routing and approval.
*
If you have never worked in PD, please contact your business
administrator immediately to help you log-on, verify your profile
and, if necessary, designate others to work on your behalf. You
can either personally upload data or designate someone else to
upload components of your proposal.
*
Once you have begun the process, remember that individual sections
of PD proposals can be edited at any time along the way - done
this way the system does not bog down with last minute “data
downloads” of full proposals.
*
Whether or not others helped create/modify your documents -
faculty (as PI) must personally log-on to complete the
certifications and “submit” the proposal for internal routing.
*
Once submitted in final form, proposals will be routed via PennERA
to NIH (grants.gov), and grants.gov provides e-notification to the
faculty and Penn of receipt - faculty must then personally verify
that the submitted proposal appears on the grants.gov site in the
exact form that they desire.
*
Because of these multiple routing requirements it is critical that
faculty adhere to our established internal submission deadlines -
your full proposal must be submitted internally (to the SOM Office
of Research Services-ORS) in final form no later than 3 business
days prior to the NIH deadline.
The upcoming deadlines are
Competing Revisions
Internal Deadline: 9 a.m., Friday, 17 April → NIH Deadline: Tuesday,
21 April
Challenge Grants (RC1)
Internal Deadline: 9 a.m., Thursday, 23 April → NIH Deadline: Monday
27 April
We have made substantial enhancements to our internal routing and
approval process and staff with regard to stimulus proposals; thus, we
anticipate that the limiting factor regulating system-system
e-submission will be the grants.gov interface. Adhering to these
deadlines will allow us to overcome this hurdle and ensure successful,
error-free uploads of your proposal to grants.gov.
For those faculty who plan to personally upload documents directly
into PennERA, ORS has developed both a general reference guide:
http://project.pennera.upenn.edu/PD_docs/InvestigatorRef.pdf
as well as, a reference guide specifically for Competitive Revisions:
https://www.med.upenn.edu/stimulus/secure/documents/QuickRefNOT-OD-09-058compsupplr1.pdf
Please keep in mind that the School has also dedicated additional
staff to provide support for faculty who have questions or need help
with the Proposal Development (PD) system. While it is ideal to
coordinate your request for PD support through your business
administrator, if this is not possible contact 898-1042 directly.
Noted below are other related items of interest for submissions
involving animals and humans:
Animal and Human Approvals
Competitive Revisions: You should include a current IRB/IACUC approval
letter, if available. Otherwise, the Competitive Revision proposal
should be submitted with approval listed as “pending.” The University
highly recommends that you file human and animal protocols with
Regulatory Affairs as soon as possible after the NIH Competitive
Revision deadline to ensure approval prior to award. Regulatory
Affairs has provided additional guidance:
http://www.upenn.edu/research/stimulus/IACUC.html
Challenge Grants: Proposal submission should follow the usual new
application process, with IRB/IACUC approvals listed as “pending” if a
protocol has not yet been submitted and/or approved. In contrast to
the Just-In-Time process, the University highly recommends that you
file human and animal protocols with Regulatory Affairs as soon as
possible after the NIH Challenge deadline to ensure approval prior to
award. Regulatory Affairs has provided additional guidance:
http://www.upenn.edu/research/stimulus/IRB.html
As always, please contact [email protected] or (215)
898-1042 if you have questions or need assistance.