Manage an Award

Responsibilities of the Principal Investigator or Project Director Applying for a Grant

• Notifying the Grants and Foundations Manager, Lydia Spencer, as early as possible of your intention to apply for a grant.
• Reading the funding opportunity notice in detail.
• Drafting a proposal that follows the relevant guidelines or instructions in it. Watch for requirements regarding page limits, font style and size, margins and line spacing, special page headers and footers.
• Recommended: have a colleague read your draft proposal for content, clarity and accuracy.
• Being aware of items that require collaboration or an outside agency and initiating these early in the grant process (e.g., letters of support—draft these for your partners/supporters and you will get them back easier and faster).
• Compliance with all grant policies in the college handbook, faculty section, at http://handbook.rhodes.edu/externally-funded-grants-and-contracts
• Preparing the budget and budget narrative.
• Filling out the External Grant Checklist (links to Box) appropriately and completely, attaching it to the draft proposal and budget with a brief abstract, and circulating it for signatures. Allow 2 weeks for this process; plan to have all documentation submitted to Lydia Spencer, the grants and foundations manager, 2 weeks before the grant deadline.
• Securing Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval or exemption as appropriate, for projects that include research with human participants. More information can be found at the IRB microsite.

If you have been awarded a grant from an external funder, congratulations! Be sure to notify the Grants and Foundations Manager, Lydia Spencer.

The procedures described here are to help faculty who have received external funding, to ensure successful management of the grant. Although the college is legally accountable to the grant funder as the official recipient of the grant, the Principal Investigator or Project Director is responsible for the proper fiscal management and conduct of the project.

Your grant agreement is a legal, binding contract with the federal agency or foundation. It is important to follow grant management guidelines to maintain your own good standing with that organization, as well as the college’s, for future funding eligibility.

The Grants, Foundations and Stewardship staff will support you post-award by serving as a resource on budgeting matters, compliance requirements, reporting, communication with the funder and with internal Rhodes departments.

Rhodes’ Finance office will set up the necessary accounts for your grant, review and process grant expenditures, request payment from funders, and ensure that accounting procedures, college policies and federal regulations are followed.

The Principal Investigator or Project Director is responsible for all aspects of conducting the grant-funded project, including:

• Submitting original award documentation to the Grants and Foundations Manager, Lydia Spencer.
• Submitting any funds received to the Grants and Foundations Manager, Lydia Spencer.
• Ensuring that the project stays within the scope of the approved proposal and budget.
• Working with Grants and Foundations Manager Lydia Spencer and the Finance Division in the event of any significant deviations from the approved budget, timeline, or other terms of the grant.
• Submitting all required reports on time and providing copies of all reports and grant-related correspondence to the Grants and Foundations Manager, Lydia Spencer.
• Complying with all terms and conditions of the funder and all applicable college policies and procedures.
• Following college purchasing policies and maintaining all receipts.
• Certifying Effort Reports for all federal grants.
• Monitoring any subawardees on the grant.
• Keeping records for at least seven years after the date of the final expenditure report.

No-Cost Extensions. Most funders will allow a no-cost extension (NCE), provided that you justify how the additional time will allow you to complete the project (not just extra time to spend any remaining funds).

NCE requests to the National Science Foundation. The first NCE to an NSF grant is automatic and must be submitted via Fastlane by the Grants and Foundations Manager, Lydia Spencer, at least 10 days prior to the expiration of the grant period. The second NCE (for a second additional year) requires NSF approval and must be submitted via Fastlane by the Grants and Foundations Manager, Lydia Spencer, on your behalf, at least 45 days prior to the expiration of the grant period.