Grantopedia

Support for the Health Care Innovation Challenge Grant

Cayuse 424 version 4.8 is shipping to Cayuse customers this weekend, with support for the Health Care Innovation Challenge grant. Nearly a billion dollars is allocated to this grant opportunity, to be awarded in increments from $1,000,000 to $30,000,000.

Cayuse is pleased to deliver full support for this opportunity. Cayuse customers can collaboratively prepare the grant application, validate that the application is error-free, and submit the proposal electronically to Grants.gov.

In addition, Cayuse 424 makes it easy to import their subcontractor's budgets into the prime proposal. Non-Cayuse customers can use the free service at Subawards.com to prepare their subcontract proposal and send it to their Cayuse-powered collaborators for import and electronic submission.

From the grant announcement:

This initiative will fund applicants who propose compelling new models of service delivery/payment improvements that hold the promise of delivering the three-part aim of better health, better health care, and lower costs through improved quality for Medicare, Medicaid, and Children?s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) enrollees.

NIH and NRSA funding levels

NIH announced at the Federal Demonstration Partnership meeting last month that overall appropriations for the balance of the fiscal year are set at $30.9 B, a 1% decrease relative to last year's funding. However, the National Research Service Awards (NRSA) program recieved a 2% increase in funding.

Two other notes from the NIH regarding research grant applications:

• The Personal Statement in teh Biosketch can now be used to explain a hiatus or reduced productivity.
• No Cost Extensions (NCEs) can now be requested for 1 to 12 months, previously it was only 6, 9, or 12 months.

Updated NIH Kirschstein-NRSA Rates

NIH has published the updated stipend levels and rates for training and fellowships in FY 2011.  These rates are used in creating budgets for F and T grant opportunities with deadlines after 4/25/2011. Cayuse customers prepare and submit these opportunities electronically in Cayuse 424, and the rate tables are stored in the system. That makes it easy to create accurate budgets for proposals.

Budget calculations on sponsored research

In a post on the SRA Catalyst newsletter, author Michael DeShazo provides a very clear tutorial on how to use Excel to determine F&A costs when you only know the total project budget and exempt expenses. He also created a very nice video showing how to build the formulas in Excel.

Similar calculations are done automatically in the budget development tools in Cayuse 424. In addition to determining total direct and indirect costs based on institutional F&A rates, Cayuse 424 will validate the budget form against published agency rules and other submission guidelines. Building accurate budgets for federal sponsors is fast and easy in Cayuse 424. You won't be surprised to know that we demo this regularly.

Update on grant proposal submissions and operations during shut-down

The best information we have as of today is that Grants.gov will continue to operate normally during a federal government shut-down. The site is hosted and staffed by a government contractor at a third party location. These operations are fully funded, so all indications point to grant applications being processed normally by the Grants.gov servers.

Most of the main sponsoring agencies, like the NIH, have systems which automatically retrieve grant proposals from Grants.gov. As long as Grants.gov is accepting applications and as long as the automated agency systems are retrieving them, proposals will be submitted normally.

However, anything that requires human interaction would be subject to delay. Technical issues with a submission, for example, that would normally route through a help desk escalation process would not be likely to receive attention during a shut-down, owing to staff and contractor furloughs. This good news for Cayuse sites, since errors or problems on proposals are quite rare.

The official guidelines from the White House to the federal agencies are posted here (PDF). The only services and web sites that would continue operating are "excepted activities," meaning those that deal with public safety.

This article from Federal Computing Weekly offers reporting on questions surrounding other types of government web sites.

Grants.gov System Upgrade April 2

Grants.gov will be off-line for around 12 hours starting midnight, Saturday, April 2 as they do upgrades and maintenance. More details here on the Grants.gov blog.

If you have grant applications with deadlines of April 4 or 5, it's a good idea to submit well in advance. It's always smart to submit early, regardless of scheduled maintenance.

Cayuse 424 Supporting the NSF Research.gov Application Submission Web Service

National Science Foundation (NSF) and Cayuse are pleased to announce the availability of the Research.gov Application Submission Web Service for all Cayuse 424 customers. This new service enables research institutions to seamlessly use Cayuse 424 to prepare and submit grant applications directly to NSF via Research.gov.

With Research.gov Application Submission Web Service, NSF offers the following benefits for Cayuse424 customers:

• Enable you to use the system you are familiar with to submit application packages directly to NSF.
• Offer a seamless submission process – prepare and submit applications the same way you would submit any other electronically submittable application.
• Provide fast confirmation of application package receipt from Research.gov.
• Leverage the Research and Related data standard used across the government.

This new Research.gov service will be available for all Cayuse 424 institutions Starting March 7, 2011. In conjunction with the expansion, we are inviting all Cayuse customers to participate in a webcast demonstration of this new Research.gov service.  The webcast demonstration is scheduled for Thursday, March 3 at 2:30 EST / 11:30 PST and will provide an overview of the Application Submission Web Service, as well as a walkthrough of the Cayuse 424 preparation and submission process.

To register for the webcast, click here.

For more information about Application Submission Web Service and the webcast demonstration, please contact Research.gov at feedback@Research.gov or Cayuse at customerops@cayuse.com.

NIH to Eliminate Error Correction Window

Have you heard that the two-day error correction window will close for NIH, AHRH, and NIOSH applications due on or after January 25, 2011?

For organizations that use Cayuse 424, the effect will be minimal. The robust error checking validation engine ensures that your first submission is error-free over 99% of the time. Cayuse customers do not use the correction window to correct errors. The software does it for them - before submission.

Cayuse and the National Science Foundation

Cayuse and the National Science Foundation have teamed up to pilot a new solution that enables research institutions to use Cayuse424 to prepare and submit grant applications directly to NSF via Research.gov. This new service, called Application Submission Web Service (ASWS), creates a seamless experience between applicants and NSF.

Starting this spring, an initial group of Cayuse customers now have the option to download a grant application from Research.gov, prepare it in Cayuse424, and submit it directly to NSF using ASWS. This new service leverages the Grants.gov framework and is consistent with the standard data formats used by Grants.gov.

Cayuse worked closely with the NSF to develop the link between Cayuse424 and Research.gov, and is looking forward to potential future enhancements based on this new service. Cayuse customers University of Delaware, University of Texas at Austin, California Institute of Technology, New York University and the University of New Mexico, are among the first to try Application Submission Web Service.

NIH changes program announcement numbers

You may have noticed changes in the program announcement naming convention for the NIH parent opportunities. For example, the Parent R01 is now PA-10-067. That can lead to confusion if you're searching for opportunities by announcement number using the old number. Here is the link to the new Parent Announcements (For Unsolicited or Investigator-Initiated Applications):
http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/parent_announcements.htm