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CHAPTER 6
The Form and I: Writing Proposals for the Way They Are Read
Now is a good time to consider forms in a little more detail.
Most of the federal granting agencies and some private grantors provide a booklet of forms to use in grant proposals, along with instructions on filling out the forms. Some university grant proposals do not usually have boiler plate forms.
Getting the boiler plate done right is important because the granting agencies use the information on the forms to carry out various administrative responsibilities. The forms are pretty routine and easy to get done. They do take some time, but by breaking pieces out and getting some help from support staff, if it is available, we can complete one part of developing a competitive proposal without much fanfare.
Individuals in granting agencies do not just sit down and read a grant proposal from start to finish, just as we do not write grant proposals from start to finish, albeit for different reasons. If we know something about how grant proposals are read, we can plan our work for each element of the proposal.
Here, in general terms, are some things that can happen to our otherwise innocent proposal:
One agency staff member will use a copy of the proposal to enter some of the information from the cover page into a computer file. If the information is incorrect or incomplete, the proposal may be returned without review. Administrations help us on this point by reviewing our proposals for errors before they are submitted formally.
The summary, or abstract, page often is copied and made available to people (such as legislators and policymakers) who oversee the granting agency. If the abstract does not accurately reflect the needs and values of the agency, the proposal may not be funded because many people do not read the proposal. The only part they read is the abstract.
This is an important point, so let me emphasize that even within review panels most reviewers see only the summary, not the entire proposal. This is a crucial section of our proposals.
* Effort in the abstract
We can turn that to our advantage by putting real effort into our abstracts. Remember—if the abstract does not accurately reflect the aims in the main body of the proposal, or fails to convey the need for the work, the proposal will be marked down. "Marked down" is an expression my dear old professor used in reference to unsatisfactory grades.
The budget is taken out for independent analysis by another part of the agency: If the budget does not make sense, the proposal may not be reviewed, or if it is reviewed, it could be marked down due to poor budget planing. Folks here at the University can help us be sure the budgets are correctly calculated, but we are responsible for making sure the budget is appropriate for the work we intend to do.
* The biographical sketch
There are, of course, other elements of the boiler plate, including a biographical sketch. We want to include our education, and a list of our professional positions. Some people give up a little space to list their major awards. I usually omit my out-of-date glider pilot's certificate and undergraduate position as a tow truck driver for an auto repossession firm.
If we are discussing a proposal for NIH, we can list as many of our publications as will fit on the remaining space plus one page. If it is NSF, we can list five publications that relate directly to the work on the proposal, and five other supporting publications.
We should give this page some thought, because we want to convey our experience and capability to conduct the work we are proposing. We should avoid conveying any sense of puffing up our record.
The federal agencies also want to know about all of our other support. We should include any institutional support, all active grants and all pending grant proposals. We can use this element of proposals to convey a couple of things.
First, other support indicates that we have an active program capable of doing work. Second, any support that comes from Nebraska represents institutional investment in the project. We can state this directly.
For example, if we have a seed money grant from UNL, we can write something like, "This money indicates that UNL strongly supports this research."
We also are expected to list our pending grant proposals, and sometimes even the proposals we are planning for the near future. Consider this, too: We need to state what proportion of our time will go to each project, and we want to be sure that we have the proportions add up to no more than 100 percent of our time.
For illustration, imagine we have a split appointment with 75 percent research and 25 percent teaching. We list a project that provides some dollars and state that we devote 50 percent of our time to that project. Then we have a University of Nebraska Foundation grant that gets 20 percent of our effort. And we have a small interdisciplinary project with somebody in anthropology, to which we give 5 percent of our time. Now, we claim we are going to invest 50 percent effort on the current proposal, if it is selected for funding.
Somebody in the agency, who is supposed to pay attention to these things, is going to wonder how a faculty member can fulfill the responsibility of 125 percent research and 25 percent teaching.
We want to be sure our programs add up to something close to 100 percent of us. If the total goes over, then we can express how we would adjust our activities to fit everything into 100 percent of our time if the proposal is funded.
We have already discussed the "Resources and Environment" section of grant proposals. Again, we can use this section to convey how well equipped we are to do the work we propose.
We take the idea that a grant proposal is composed of various elements—a cover page, a summary, a budget and so forth. We want to recognize that each element often is studied as an independent element of the proposal.
Because agencies have the resources to study the separate elements of proposals, we must pay appropriate attention to each element. Because each element of the grant proposal is meant to serve separate functions, and is directed to a different audience, we need to be pretty particular about the standard forms.
The budget is a crucial standard form, so let's look at it in more detail.
Agencies usually frown on grant proposals that include a huge equipment budget disproportionate to the amount and kind of work in the proposal.
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* Budgets
What is the right amount of money to request in our proposals? The amount of money required to accomplish the work we want to do.
The elements of a grant proposal budget usually include salaries for personnel, equipment, supplies, operating costs, travel, consultants and other costs.
I once made a mistake of trying to be very frugal in my budget request. The proposal was funded, but to my horror I had under budgeted the complete cost of a graduate research assistant. I paid dearly for that error.
* Personnel
Personnel can include part of our salary as Principal Investigator, usually the equivalent of our summer salary. Other personnel costs include the salaries of postdoctoral associates and graduate student stipends. Salaries for faculty, post-doctoral associates and graduate students are easy to calculate.
Federal agencies stipulate that any faculty member's salary from their home institution and their grants cannot exceed 100 percent of their annual salary. We simply put in our actual salary for the work we intend to do.
We can learn the typical post-doctoral salaries in our specific fields from our unit heads and from our colleges. Graduate student stipends are set by each unit.
The budget forms have a column for fringe benefits, and we calculate our fringe benefits for faculty, post-doctoral associates and graduate students at a percent of salary (e.g. 23 percent at UNL). For graduate students the 23 percent goes toward tuition remission. Of course, each institution has its own policy on this, and we should check it before completing the budget.
We often include funds for casual labor, perhaps summer assistants for field work or a laboratory helper. These individuals are usually undergraduate students. One good way to determine the amount of money for this category is to simply multiply the number of hours of work by the hourly wage.
It's good to calculate a little buffer zone into this. We do not ask for fringe benefits for casual labor. We need to be aware that students are not entitled to unemployment compensation at the end of the project.
Non-student hourly individuals are eligible for unemployment pay. The unemployment pay will come from our projects, not the University resources. This is one of those minor points that we don't want to learn after somebody puts in for unemployment.
* Equipment costs
Equipment is usually regarded as items that cost more than $500 and are expected to last longer than the life of a typical grant period, but this varies by agency. NSF (CGPG 95-27) defined equipment as an item exceeding $5,000 and one year of useful life. We can ask for whatever equipment we need to complete the work in our proposals. Be warned, however, that granting agencies expect major research universities, such as ours, to invest in research equipment. Our aim is to create a sort of balancing act.
We want to express that we are equipped to conduct the work in the proposal, or that we are almost equipped to do the work, but not quite completely. Agencies usually frown on grant proposals that include a huge equipment budget disproportionate to the amount and kind of work in the proposal.
My rule of thumb is ask for no more than one piece of equipment, although some people have been quite successful with larger requests.
Be specific in equipment requests. List the precise item, with manufacturer, model number and so forth. List the cost, and allow for all the minor extras you may have to purchase to actually get the equipment running. Also allow for installation, shipping, handling and inflation.
* Supplies
The rule here is that we should request enough money to do the work we want to do. In practical terms, it means we need to know how much it costs to work in our own fields. We also need to be aware that granting agencies study this section of our grants very carefully.
We can make some pretty good estimates by looking at similar grant proposals from our colleagues. We also can do some calculations. If we buy a particular radioactive compound once a month, then we need 12 times that cost for a year's work.
This is an important section of the proposal, because proposals can be turned down if the costs are wildly out of line. If we underestimate our costs, it can be said that there is not enough resource to do the work; if we overestimate, it can be said we are padding our proposals, or that we do not really know how to budget our work.
* Operating costs
We should include funds for the operating expenses of our programs. This can include a range of expenses, such as telephones, copying and equipment maintenance. Again, we want to be thoughtful about that, because many operating costs are not devoted exclusively to a specific grant project.
Agencies are unwilling to pay all the maintenance costs for an item of equipment devoted to three projects in addition to the work in the proposal. Similarly, we want to note that we do not use our telephones exclusively for communications within a specific project.
Again—it is appropriate to request funds to support all aspects of the work in our proposals.
What we want to convey is a very clear sense of exactly what the collaborators will contribute to the proposal.
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* Travel
It is appropriate to request funds to cover the costs of travel associated with the work in our proposals, and to present the results of our work at professional meetings. We should be fairly specific about the destinations and costs of our travel.
Foreign travel usually is considered separately from domestic travel, and should be appropriately justified. For example, some professional groups meet in an overseas venue once every three or four years. It is appropriate to request foreign travel to participate in these significant events.
* Consultant and subcontract costs
The competitive posture of some grant proposals can be much improved by a variety of collaborative arrangements. An individual with a particular expertise that will directly enable the work you are doing may enter into a formal collaborative arrangement with you.
Sometimes we use the services of consultants—for example, a statistician who will help with experimental designs. Or, we might let a contract for a specific piece of work, possibly with a chemist who will synthesize a particular compound.
This section of grant proposals allows us to be creative because we do not necessarily have to be able to do every little thing in the proposal ourselves.
One of my colleagues has been working on biochemical and physiological aspects of disease transmission by ticks for the last two decades or so. As he was planning the competitive renewal of his NIH grant, he realized that the next logical step in his work would take him into my area of expertise.
After a few meetings and (painfully) long discussions, I helped write the proposal, and agreed to do some of the work as a subcontractor. The reviewers directly commented on the point that the appropriate expert was involved in the work, and the proposal was funded.
To be sure, that was not the sole reason the proposal was funded. As has been said throughout, all elements of competitive grant proposals need to be strong. But we can improve our proposals by developing various collaborative arrangements.
For the purposes of filling out the boiler plate, we need to provide all the particulars of the arrangement. This includes the names and affiliations of the collaborators, as well as a detailed description of the collaborative or contractual arrangement. What we want to convey is a very clear sense of exactly what the collaborators will contribute to the proposal.
As with all budgetary aspects of grant proposals, we need to spell out the precise costs of the arrangements.
* Budget justification
Always write a page or two of justifications just following the budget, whether or not it's required. Make a subheading for each section and briefly justify each expense.
Under personnel, spell out what each individual, including the principal investigator, will contribute. Under travel, note that the principal investigator plans to attend one scientific meeting per year. Under supplies, note that the supply costs are in line with the sort of work in the proposal. If there are particularly expensive supplies, such as restriction enzymes, note that the supply costs reflect these expensive requirements.
We also can use this section to spell out how the University is contributing to the project. The salary of the principal investigator is an example of University contribution. Equipment purchased as part of our start-up budgets or on in-house grants also represents University commitment to the project.
* Indirect costs
Indirect costs, sometimes called "overhead," are meant to reimburse a university for real costs for performing research and other sponsored activities. For research sponsored by federal agencies, all research institutions establish indirect costs' rates by periodic direct negotiation with a designated lead agency. For example, at UNL it is the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Some agencies set their own indirect cost rates, and leave it up to research institutions to accept the preferred rate. The USDA allows 14 percent; some private research firms (Proctor and Gamble, for instance) allow 10 percent. The Nebraska commodity boards do not allow indirect cost recovery. The RGCO keeps us up-to-date on changing indirect rules.
* Use the current value
Of course, indirect costs change, and it is our responsibility to use the current value.
Indirect costs' rates are renegotiated periodically. Check with RGCO personnel to verify the current indirect cost rate.
For perspective, some private research institutes charge considerably higher indirect cost rates. SRI International (in Menlo Park, CA) used to charge 116 percent of total costs to federal agencies and 300 percent to private firms.
* OMB Circular A-21
Federal regulations entitled "Cost Principles for Educational Institutions," known to most of us as OMB Circular A-21, spell out what costs can be charged against federal funds, and they more or less clearly distinguish direct from indirect costs. We need to be aware of these regulations because they influence how we structure the budgets in our grant proposals. I don't like to dwell on what can happen when our budgets are not structured correctly.
* Direct costs: know 'em when you see 'em
Direct costs can be specifically identified as a part of a project or activity with a high degree of accuracy. Usual examples of direct costs include salaries of professional and technical staff, research supplies, travel and specialized shop costs. Telephone toll charges may be direct costs, but the local monthly service charges are not direct costs.
We usually regard indirect costs as a direct percentage of the total costs. But what about administrative costs, such as secretarial assistance?
OMB Circular A-21 is pretty clear on this: Administrative salaries and clerical staff normally should be treated as indirect costs, right along with other indirect costs such as general operating expenses. For most of us, this means we are not supposed to add secretarial salaries into our budgets as a direct cost because secretarial salaries already are calculated into the indirect cost percentage as administrative costs.
Grants administration being what it is, OMB Circular A-21 allows direct administrative costs in some projects. These usually are large projects in which administrative or clerical activities are explicitly budgeted for specifically identified individuals. Projects that entail extensive data accumulation and entry and projects that require making detailed travel and meeting arrangements for large numbers of individuals are examples of situations in which direct administrative costs may be included in the budget.
The point is that a research program is not just a collection of tasks. It is an integrated, thematic entity that often involves a number of people.
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* The University Policies
Budgets for all supported projects (LWF, LWL, LWT and LWW funds), regardless of the source of funds, will observe the limitations of administrative costs according to OMB A-21. All sources of funds are included to ensure the policy is observed for federal funds passed through a state or local agency or through another university.
Each university has procedures and policies we must follow in budgets and administration of grants. For example, here is an abridged list of rules we must follow at UNL. Each researcher is responsible for knowing the rules at their institution.
1. Include administrative personnel as direct costs only if the costs can be justified on the merits of the proposed work. The justification will need to convince the cold-blooded reviewers and grant program staff members that the costs are justified. These people will not be inclined to allow administrative costs.
2. Publication, postage, telephone line service, office supplies and equipment maintenance costs are allowable only when they are explicitly approved by the funding agency.
I usually include publication costs, but none of the other costs, in my grant proposal budgets. Maybe that's why those other costs never get funded.
3. Rebudgeting funds into these administrative categories will require prior approval by the granting agency, except when such rebudgeting is allowed under the Institution Prior Approval System (IPAS).
4. We need prior approval from the RGCO—Finance to rebudget funds under IPAS policies. The request for rebudgeting should be attended by elegantly argued justifications.
Of course, the OMB Circular A-21 has certain broader implications for budgeting in existing grant-supported projects. Each unit administrator should have a complete copy of the University policy on Circular A-21.
* Making profits for your program: projects that we cannot afford to do
On the dark side of the grant proposal moon lies an idea that we need to consider: Some grant programs offer funds we cannot afford to accept. This becomes clearer when we consider our needs vis á vis the needs of a granting agency.
Returning to our chant, granting agencies need to award funds to support work that meets the agency's needs, and we need grant support to help us do our work.
It sounds rather like a zero sum arrangement: We write a proposal, get some support, spend some money, do some work; if we are fortunate, we are required to write only five or six thousand reports on what we did with the money. Yet another aspect of our careers lurks behind this scenario: To develop the most expressive academic careers in research or teaching, we need to develop programs. Programs are different from accomplishing specific projects in the sense that projects are elements of programs.
Individuals with research appointments or teaching/research appointments can relate to this idea. Acquiring a particular bit of equipment that will be devoted to a course we teach can be one element of our program, and conducting a research project can be another. Our research also can be programmatic.
A research program on the reproductive endocrinology of emus may have several elements. A graduate student might spend a fair amount of time observing the mating behavior of adult emus, while another graduate student may be working on the circulating levels of certain hormones in emus in their various stages of reproduction. The personalities of the students may figure pretty big here because emus are not known to volunteer urine samples or sit quietly while a youthful phlebotomist draws a few drops of blood.
The point is that a research program is not just a collection of tasks. It is an integrated, thematic entity that often involves a number of people.
* Profit means growth
A grant that supports a single activity without providing a small margin of "profit" to support long-term program growth is a grant we cannot afford to accept. How does the concept of profit fit into academic activities?
As used here, profit means lasting growth for our programs.
We might be awarded a small grant that allows us to purchase a microcentrifuge to help with a project. The usual scenario is played out: Equipment is purchased, the work is done, 5,000 reports and one publication are written, and the project is completed.
The profit is that the centrifuge remains as part of our program. Our program has grown slightly because a piece of equipment is available for routine use in a number of future projects. Hourly labor can contribute similarly to our programs.
* Many kinds of profit
There are many kinds of profit in academic work. A graduate student may be supported through an entire degree program, and we can say that not only was the work done, but an educational program was completed. A research grant may support a research project, and allow purchase of equipment that also gets used in teaching.
Profits are usually small, only rarely large. Nevertheless, the slow accumulation of these academic profits can facilitate remarkable program growth.
We want to be careful in our thinking about program growth, because growth should be defined in terms of the sort of program we are considering.
Some programs grow by attracting a good-sized group of individuals, others by developing an unseen, but crucial, infrastructure. There are substantial advantages to growing our programs. It can help us get more work done in the same unit time and with the same personal effort. In some situations we get to be involved in more activities, or interact with more people.
* Resilience for hard times
A less obvious advantage is that well-grown programs are more resilient in hard times. They're able to take a hit now and then, and continue to move forward. It is this resiliency that makes program growth so important.
A lengthy series of profitless activities may allow us to conduct some work, and to produce documented outcomes of our work, but profitless projects will not sustain our programs in the long run. It is our responsibility to ensure that most of our funded projects allow a modest profit for long-term program growth.
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