WESTERN KENTUCKY UNIVERSITY

Office of Sponsored Programs THIRD QUARTER Report, FY 98
JANUARY 1, 1998 -- MARCH 31, 1998
Prepared: August 23, 1998

Office of Sponsored Programs
106 Foundation Building
Western Kentucky University
Bowling Green, KY 42101-3576
Telephone: (502) 745-4652
FAX: (502) 745-4211
E-mail: phillip.myers@wku.edu
Web Site: http://www.wku.edu/Dept/Support/SponsPrg/grants/home.htm

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Introduction

This Third Quarter Report covers the activities of the Office of Sponsored Programs at Western Kentucky University from January 1, 1998, through March 31, 1998. During this period, the University received 42 awards totaling $2,435,938, the highest in the last three years; and submitted 56 proposals totaling $4,410,320. There was 1 more award than a year ago and the dollar amount of awards increased by 61%. Included in the awards was $215,994 in indirect costs, which is the largest amount of indirect costs awarded in the third quarter in the last three years. A year ago, $67,199 was awarded in indirect costs, an increase of 221% in indirect costs awarded compared to a year ago; but an increase of 262% over two years ago. In addition, WKU cash cost shared $538,089 above the $2,435,938 awarded. Total awards therefore equaled $2,974,027. WKU cost shared 18% of the total award dollars.

Included in the 56 proposals was $391,917 in indirect costs. WKU cash cost shared $643,747 in addition to the $4,410,320 proposed to external sponsors. This makes total proposals equal to $5,054,067. WKU cost shared 13% of the total amount proposed.

Awards

The 61% increase in award amount was caused principally by over $909,645 more awarded forresearch grants compared to third quarter 1997. Seen another way, Federal funding was up $1,250,131 and state funding increased $363,397 compared to last year.

Proposals

The dollar amount of proposals submitted decreased by $255,782 (-5%) compared to a year ago. There were 7 fewer proposals than a year ago.

Twenty-eight percent of the dollar amount of proposals submitted supported research, whereas 47% of the dollar amount supported research last year, a 19% decrease. The dollar amount of research proposals was about $1,340,207 less than last year. There were 14 more Federal proposals for $886,179 more than last year. There were 13 fewer proposals to state agencies for $682,970 less than last year. There were 3 fewer proposals to foundations for $290,731 less than last year.

Summary Awards and Proposals Comparisons with 3^rd Quarters in Previous Years

Other Activities in the Sponsored Programs Community

The OSP Web Site: http://www.wku.edu/Dept/Support/SponsPrg/grants/home.htm

Sponsored Programs continued to rely heavily on the WKUNET to expedite operations through widespread use of e-mail with project directors and grant developers. Electronic postings were made of grant opportunities, deadlines, tips, and policies and procedures. The OSP Web site provides faculty and staff members with information from the grant community nationwide. Issues of local.grants, the OSP newsletter, were placed on the OSP Web site and direct mailed. Monthly tallies of awards received and proposals submitted were published in On Campus and on the OSP Web site. The Web site contains information to facilitate pre- and post-award developments for the campus.

Summary of Other Activities of the OSP during the 3rd Quarter FY 98

The OSP assists departments with subgrants and non-cash affiliation agreements. The OSP coordinated 4 subgrants to other institutions totaling $178,478, and 32 affiliation agreements with regional hospitals, clinics, and medical offices on behalf of internship programs in Allied Health and Human Services, Biology, Nursing, and Public Health.

The OSP staff attended professional meetings and chaired or served on university committees dealing with intellectual property, conflict of interest, faculty research, human subjects of research, women's issues, and records management. Marilyn Anderson, Grants Specialist, and Sharon Young, Staff Accountant, attended the Fundamentals of Sponsored Project Administration four-day workshop hosted by the National Council of University Research Administrators.

Funding Agencies

ABBREVIATIONS USED IN REPORTS

As you can see by consulting any of the tables in the appendices, brevity is required for entries into the OSP database of awards and proposals. Each database sheet is a record containing one award or proposal. There are a number of fields in each record which require brevity. For this reason, the following abbreviations are used for consistency in creating reports and the data that the reports produce.

Funding Agencies

INTRODUCTION

The Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP) provides pre- and post-award services for faculty, staff members, and students seeking external support for research, instruction, public service, scholarships, and fellowships. The OSP helps faculty and staff members develop grants, memorandum of agreements, contracts, subcontracts (subgrants), and affiliation agreements. The OSP is the link between extramural projects and the Offices of Academic Affairs, Graduate College and Research, Accounts and Fiscal Services, and Budget and Management Information. For example, the office works closely with Budget and Management Information in projecting extramural expenditures and revenues.

The OSP coordinates with academic colleges and departments, and all support units of the University. On behalf of these entities, the OSP coordinates proposal and award routing; maintains records of faculty and staff members' interests; identifies potential sponsors; assists with proposal development; presents grant development and compliance workshops; cooperates with grant development initiatives of the deans, the Center for Teaching and Learning, and units across the campus; provides individual consultation; renders contract compliance and institutional assurance; establishes charts of accounts for awards; negotiates post-award modifications; provides liaison with external agencies on behalf of the University, and computes the University indirect cost rates and negotiates the rates with the cognizant Federal agency. The OSP manages intellectual property and copyright matters. The OSP is the authorized representative for signature for all documents associated with extramural funding activities.

AWARDS RECEIVED, 3rd Quarter FY 98

In this reporting period, Western Kentucky University received 42 awards in the amount of $2,435,938 that included $215,994 in indirect costs awarded. (See Appendix A.) Compared to last year, these data reflect an increase of 1 award. The award dollar amount increased from last year by $921,019, or +61%.

Compared to last year, there was an increase of $148,795 in indirect recovery costs (+221%). Indirect costs awarded a year ago equaled $67,199.

Table 1: AWARDS RECEIVED, 1996-1998

Table 2: Awards Received by Academic College and Other Units 3rd Quarter FY 98

Awards Received by Academic Departments, 3rd Quarter FY 98

Nine academic departments, 4 less than last year, and 3 more than 1996, and 18 faculty members (2 less than last year) received 25 awards. This number of awards was 60% of the total awards, 93 percent of the award dollars, and 99% of the indirect costs. As Table 3a shows, last year 13 academic departments received 48% of total number of awards, 75% of award dollars and 93% of indirect costs. In Table 3b, individuals receiving more than one award are signified with the number of awards in parenthesis.

Table 3a: 3rd Quarter FY 98-Summary of Academic Departments' Contributions to Awards

Table 3b: Academic Departments' Contribution to Awards 3rd Quarter FY 98

Table 4: Awards Received by Chief Support Units, 3rd Quarter FY 98

Chief support units contributed 13% of the dollar amount of awards. They contributed 2% of the indirect costs derived from awards. In all, 7 project directors in 7 support units received awards.

Table 5: Awards Received by Award Type 3rd Quarter FY 98

There were the same number of grants totaling $221,948 more than last year. There were 2 fewer MOAs but for $110,197 more than last year. There were 4 more subcontracts for $597,567 more than last year. There was 1 less contract for $8,693 less than last year.

Table 6: Awards Received by Project Type 3rd Quarter FY 98

Compared to last year, there was 1 more award for instruction. The dollar amount of awards for instruction decreased $363,834. There were 5 fewer awards for research but for $909,645 more dollars. There were 4 more public service awards but for $327,208 more dollars than last year.

Table 7: Awards by Funding Sources 3rd Quarter FY 98

There were 7 more federal awards than last year for $1,250,131 more dollars. There was the same number of state awards as last year for $363,397 more dollars. We received 6 fewer awards from local and private agencies (local government, foundations and regional companies) for $696,509fewer dollars. (There were no awards from private foundations).

Table 8: Top Ten Awarding Agencies 3rd Quarter FY 1998

Twenty-eight sponsors made awards to WKU during this reporting period. The top ten are listed below. These ten sponsors contributed 90% of the dollars awarded and 98% of the indirect costs. Last year the top ten contributed 87% of the funding; and in 1995 the top ten contributed 93% of the dollars awarded.

PROPOSAL SUBMISSIONS

Table 9. Number and Amount of Proposals Submitted, 3rd Quarter FY 88-98

The fifth largest dollar amount of proposals in the last 8 years were submitted during the third quarter FY 98. In this reporting period, 15 academic departments, 2 more than last year, and 2 support units, 8 less than last year, comprising 30 faculty (2 more than last year) and 4 staff (6 less than last year), submitted 56 proposals (7 less than last year) totaling $4,410,320. Compared to last year, there was an 11% decrease in the number of proposals and a 5% decrease in the dollar value of proposals.

Table 10: Proposals by College and Other Units, 3rd Quarter, FY 98

Table 11. Academic Departments Submitting Proposals, 3rd Quarter, FY 98

Academic departments submitted 55% of the total dollar amount of proposals and accounted for 73% of the total number of proposals that were submitted. Two more faculty submitted proposals than last year. Two more academic departments submitted proposals than last year. The academic departments accounted for 62% of the indirect costs proposed. The academic departments submitted $1,089,190 less in proposals than last year.

Table 11a: Support Units Submitting Proposals, 3rd Quarter, FY 98

Five support units submitted 14 proposals for $1,905,577. Of this amount, $133,738 was in indirect costs. Compared to last year, 2 fewer units submitted proposals for $1,293,401 more than last year.

Table 11b: Proposals by Support Units in Academic Colleges, 3rd Quarter, FY 98

Included in the units in Table 11a was 3 support units in academic colleges that submitted proposals amounting to $1,844,087 which included $130,111 in indirect costs proposed. These proposals were submitted by 3 project director and represented 5 projects.

Table 12. Proposals Submitted by Project Type, 3rd Quarter, FY 98

Twenty-eight percent of the dollar amount of proposals supported Research, which was 19% less than the previous year. The dollar amount of research proposals was $1,340,207 less than last year. There was 1 less proposal for research than last year. There were 3 fewer proposals for Instruction than last year, but the dollar amount was $632,848 more. There was 1 less Public Service proposal than last year and the dollar amount this year was $466,597 more.

Table 13: Proposals Submitted by Agency Type, 3rd Quarter, FY 98

There were 14 more Federal proposals for $886,179 more than last year. There were 13 fewer proposals to state agencies for $682,970 less than last year. There were 7 fewer proposals to Private agencies for $461,542 less than last year. Within the Private category, there were 3 fewer proposals to foundations but for $290,731 less than last year.

Table 14: Top Ten Sponsors In Proposals Submitted, 3rd Quarter, FY 98

56% of the proposals were submitted to ten sponsors. These top ten sponsors constituted 35% more than the number of proposals to the top 10 last year. The dollar value of proposals to the top ten sponsors constituted 91% of the total dollars proposed. Last year the dollar value was 66%. Federal sponsors were conspicuous among the top ten. 97% of the indirect costs proposed were submitted to the top ten sponsors below, which was 22% over last year.

Table 15: Indirect Costs in Proposals Submitted, 3rd Quarter, FY 98

Indirect costs were included in 23 of the 56 proposals submitted (41%).

COST SHARING IN GRANTS AWARDED, 3rd Quarter, FY 98

Cost sharing by the university reflects full costing of budgets and enables accurate cost sharing budget projections. In this reporting period, $538,089, or 22% above the $2,435,938 awarded by external sponsors, consisted of WKU cost sharing as Table 16 shows. The OSP Contributions accounts contributed 10% of the total costs WKU shared in awards, or $54,410. Adding the university cost sharing to the awards from external sponsors means that the total amount of cash awards was $2,974,027. The university cash cost shared 872% more than in the previous year.

Table 16: Summary of Cash Cost Sharing Awarded by WKU 3rd Quarter, FY 96-98

Of the 42 awards for this quarter, 10, or 24%, carried cost sharing obligations. Of the 10, 4 used OSP contributions. Table 17 depicts the distribution and amounts of cost sharing compared to the previous quarter last year.

Table 17. Cost Sharing in Grants Awarded FY 96-98

Table 18: Cost Sharing Awarded from OSP Contributions Accounts, 3rd Quarter, FY 98

$54,410 was awarded out of OSP Contributions Accounts.

In addition, $17,653 was awarded for FY99 out of 218001.

Table 19: Total and Indirect Cost Sharing in Awards by Unit 3rd Quarter, FY 98

Total cost sharing rose appreciably in the current quarter compared to previous years. During the third quarter this year $538,089 was cost shared, whereas last year $61,677 was cost shared; and in third quarter FY96 $204,843 was cost shared. There was $135,755 in indirect cost sharing for 6 units in third quarter 98. A year ago, 3 units indirect cost shared $64,411; and two years ago, 8 units indirect cost shared $141,029. This year represents the highest total and indirect cost sharing in the past three years.

COST SHARING IN PROPOSALS SUBMITTED 3rd Quarter, FY 98

In addition to the $4,410,320 external funds proposed, $643,747 was proposed as university cost sharing. The sum of these numbers equals the total proposals of $5,054,067. Cost sharing was in 25 of the 42 proposals, or 60%. This cost sharing amount is $15,256 less than last year, and substantially less that Third Quarter FY96, as Table 20 shows.

Table 20: Cost Sharing in Proposals 3rd Quarter, 1998

Table 21: Cost Sharing of Proposals from OSP Contributions Accounts 3rd Quarter 1998

20 percent, or $228,461 of the total of $1,158,880 cost shared for proposals came from the three Sponsored Programs Contributions accounts as shown below for 982.

Table 22: Total and Indirect Cost Sharing in Proposals by Unit 3rd Quarter, FY 98

AFFILIATION AGREEMENTS BETWEEN WESTERN AND EXTERNAL AGENCIES

The Office of Sponsored Programs assisted 5 academic departments with coordinating 32 affiliation agreements with 6 faculty members. All were with external agencies to initiate and continue student internship programs. These agreements enable faculty members and students to interact with professionals throughout the region to enhance instruction. A breakdown bydepartment submissions for this activity is depicted in Table 23 below. There were 2 more affiliation agreements submitted than last year and 9 more than two years ago.

Table 23. Affiliation Agreements by Department, 3rd Quarter, FY 98

SUBGRANT ACTIVITIES 3rd Quarter, FY98

WKU awarded 4 new subgrants to other universities for $178,478. One subgrant each was awarded to researchers at the University of Kentucky and Morehead State University; and two were awarded to the University of Louisville Research Foundation

ACTIVITIES OF THE OFFICE OF SPONSORED PROGRAMS FIRST QUARTER, FY 98

General Activities. The Office of Sponsored Programs Web site has been online for over three years. The OSP Web site continues as the primary communication device for Western faculty, staff and students to find sponsors, prepare grants and contracts, and engage in post-award activities. It is a veritable "road map" to successful ventures through grants and contracts! It is updated frequently with new grant and workshop announcements, deadlines, policies and procedures, reports, new potential sponsors, and tips on how to discover funding success. The web site contains downloadable forms for submitting grants. It has a fact page for commonly used information on proposal cover sheets. Applications for approval of protocols for human subjects of research and disclosure statements for conflict of interest and intellectual property and copyright may be downloaded and submitted by attaching the application to email.

The Web site contains information about OSP staff to contact, current announcements of changes in protocols by sponsors, new considerations for preparing and administering grants and contracts, the mission and resources of OSP, SPIN Online to find sponsors, resources, regulations and links to all federal agencies. The Web site links you to the Foundation Center, which, in turn, will link you to many other foundations. Statistics about the Commonwealth of Kentucky to help strengthen need statements in proposals are available through this link. Another vital link fromthe OSP Web site is to the Kentucky Department of Education. To access any of these links, merely click on contents of interest.

The OSP Web site may be accessed at:

http://www.wku.edu/Dept/Support/SponsPrg/grants/home.htm

1. Grant Newsletter: The quarterly newsletter, local.grants, featured grant training opportunities offered by the OSP and Center for Teaching and Learning. Pamela Napier, the Sponsored Programs Information Coordinator, composes local.grants. Faculty and staff members are welcome to send her information for the newsletter.

2. Monthly Reports of Proposals and Awards: Beginning in September of 1996, the OSP began to compile and disseminate a list of faculty and staff who submitted proposals to external sponsors and received awards. It is distributed to the grants community and published in On Campus. Copies disseminated may be found in the Appendices to the quarterly reports and on the OSP web site.

3. Pre-Award Activities. Grant Workshops: Pamela Napier, Phil Myers, and Marilyn Anderson, presented the Compliance Workshop to 6 participants on January 29; Basic Grants Workshop to 14 participants on February 25 and 26 (same session twice). A large team of university and community grant writers developed a Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Proposal. Proposal development workshops were given to two graduate research methods classes in Public Health and Nursing by Pamela Napier.

SPIN Searches: During Third Quarter, FY 1998, 14 searches for potential sponsors were conducted for faculty, staff and graduate students by Sponsored Programs staff.

Grant development meetings occurred with 165 faculty, staff, and students.

E-mail Network: Grant announcements were e-mailed to faculty and staff on targeted Sponsored Programs mailing lists. These messages contained announcements for new grant competitions, deadlines for submissions, tips on writing to various sponsors, and recent compliance regulations as revised or initially incorporated by agencies. The community was informed when comments were requested by various government agencies during the formulation of new policies. The OSP Sign-off Sheet was revised and posted on the Web and on cc:Mail bulletin board. It was e-mailed to all units as an attachment.

3. Post-Award Activities. Fifty-five post-award meetings were held with numerous project directors about budgets, modifications, carry over funds, extensions, and final reports. The following table indicates the number of charts of accounts established during Third Quarter, FY98.

Table 24. Charts of Accounts

4. Human Subjects of Research (HSRB). The HSRB meets on the third Friday of each month to consider protocols. Fourteen projects were approved or pending by the Human Subjects Review Board during Third Quarter, FY 98. The level of approval is shown in the table below. All human subjects information, links to federal sources and application forms are available on the OSP Web site. A Human Subjects unit was included in the Compliance Workshop on January 29; and the OSP purchased Human Subjects Tapes from the University of Mississippi and previewed parts of the tapes with faculty and staff on March 26.

Table 25: Human Subjects Review Board Actions

5. Coordination with the General Representative in Washington, D.C. Progress was made on the water grant to establish a center at WKU. Kenneth Lee, Of Counsel, visited campus on February 11 to receive information about faculty grant activities and the water grant program.

6. The Guide to the Preparation of Grants and Contracts may be found on the OSP Web site.

7. Policy Formation. The Intellectual Property Committee met monthly to draft a revised WKU Intellectual Property Policy.

8. Professional Development Activities of the OSP Staff. Marilyn Anderson, Grants Specialist, and Sharon Young, Staff Accountant, attended the four-day NCURA Fundamentals of Grant Development Workshop in Tucson, AZ in March. Pamela Napier, Information Coordinator, attended a two-day PC repair workshop on March 11-12.

9. Task Forces. Pamela Napier contin