TITLE: Dear Colleague Letter - NSF Notice Regarding Automated Compliance
   Checking of FastLane Proposal Submissions (nsf13066)
DATE: 2/27/2013
  

   NSF 13-066

   Dear Colleague Letter - NSF Notice Regarding Automated Compliance
   Checking of FastLane Proposal Submissions

   February 27, 2013

   Beginning March 18, 2013, the NSF will enhance the FastLane System to
   begin automated compliance checking for all required sections of full
   proposals. This will bring NSF systems in line with long-standing
   proposal preparation requirements as outlined in the NSF Proposal and
   Award Policies and Procedures Guide (PAPPG) ([1]Chapter II.C.2 of the
   Grant Proposal Guide (GPG)). Preliminary proposals are not affected by
   this system enhancement.

   The GPG-required sections of a proposal include:

   Project Summary*                 Budget Justification

   Project Description              Current and Pending Support

   References Cited                 Facilities, Equipment and Other
   Resources

   Biographical Sketch(es)          Data Management Plan*

   Budget                           Postdoctoral Mentoring Plan
   (if applicable)*

   *These proposal sections are already being auto compliance checked at
   the time of proposal submission by FastLane.

   FastLane will check to ensure whether or not a document is included;
   it will not check formatting, page length, or content requirements.
   (The one exception is the Project Summary, for which page length is
   checked.)

   Proposal submission instructions for conferences, symposia or
   workshops; international travel grants; or program solicitations may
   deviate from the GPG instructions. If the submission instructions do
   not require one of the above sections to be provided, proposers ill
   need to insert text or upload a document in that section of the
   proposal that states, "Not Applicable." Doing so will enable FastLane
   to accept the proposal.

   Additionally, proposers providing Biographical Sketches and/or Current
   and Pending Support information for Principal Investigators (PIs),
   co-PI(s) or Senior Personnel in a single PDF file associated with the
   PI, must
   insert text or upload a document in that section of the proposal that
   states, "Not Applicable," for any co-PI or Senior Personnel so that
   FastLane will accept the proposal.

   PIs will receive a warning message if any of the GPG-required sections
   is missing, however, the PI will still be able to forward the proposal
   to the organization's Sponsored Project Office (SPO). If the SPO
   attempts to submit a proposal that is missing any of the required
   sections, they will receive an error message identifying the missing
   section(s), and FastLane will prevent submission to NSF. After
   obtaining all required sections, the SPO may submit the proposal to
   NSF in accordance with established deadline date policy.

   Proposals submitted through Grants.gov must include all GPG-required
   sections or include a document stating that the section is "Not
   Applicable."

   We encourage you to share this information with your respective
   communities so that they are aware of this system enhancement.
   Additional information is available on the NSF website at:
   [2]http://www.nsf.gov/bfa/dias/policy/autocompliance.jsp

   Please contact [3]policy@nsf.gov with any further questions.
   

   References 
   1. http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/policydocs/pappguide/nsf13001/gpg_2.jsp#IIC2
   2. http://www.nsf.gov/bfa/dias/policy/autocompliance.jsp
   3. mailto:policy@nsf.gov