Award Acceptance and Setup

Upon receipt of the Notice of Award from a sponsor, the Case Western Reserve University Office of Pre-Award Services and Agreements will work with the principal investigator (PI) and department administrator to accept and set up an award. The documentation of award acceptance and the set up of an award occurs through SpartaGrants and Agreements. Specific guidance for the use of SpartaGrants and Agreements is on the SpartaGrants Canvas site.

The process for accepting and setting up an award is essentially the same, regardless of whether CWRU is the prime recipient or the subrecipient. 

• A prime recipient receives money directly from the federal government and then may pay some of the funding it received to other entities.
• A subrecipient is a non-federal entity that receives a subaward from a pass-through entity to carry out part of a project.

Steps for the Acceptance and Setup of an Award

1. Typically, PASA receives the Notice of Award (NOA) from a sponsor. In cases where the PI or department administrator (DA) receives the NOA, the DA should upload it to SpartaGrants using the “Send Email” function. This will notify PASA. Please be sure to attach it to the appropriate funding proposal (FP).
2. The PASA specialist updates the FP state to enable the DA to work with the PI to revise the budget, if necessary. 
3. For any compliance requirements, the DA works with the PI to upload documentation to the appropriate FP for PASA to review, including any applicable regulatory compliance approvals from Institutional Review Board (IRB), Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC),  Institutional Biosafety Committee (IBC), etc.
4. PASA will complete additional compliance confirmations, including checking for Conflict of Interests (COI) submission, appropriate CREC training, and congruence between the proposal and the approved IACUC protocol
5. PASA will negotiate terms and conditions of the award.
   • Once the terms and conditions are agreed upon, the institutional official (IO) signs the award on behalf of CWRU. 
   • When an award does not require a signature, our acceptance of the terms is typically indicated by expenditures on the award and/or when the check is cashed or funds drawn from the government.
6. PASA staff will review all the documents submitted through SpartaGrants to accept and set up an award and its speedtypes in Peoplesoft Financials.
7. The CWRU and Sponsor NOA are released to the PI and department administrator.
8. If your award contains a subaward to an entity outside of CWRU, PASA will establish the subaward and agreements with subrecipients as needed. Guidelines for establishing agreements with subrecipients are available on the RADAR Training site. For each subaward you will need to provide a detailed budget, a scope of work and any required compliance documents. Understand the steps for setting up and paying subcontractors.
9. The research project commences. 

How Department Research Administrators Can Help

Throughout the process of setting up an award, the department administrator within a PI’s department or school can help with a range of tasks. Some of these include:

• Reminding PIs of compliance requirements
• Uploading requested information into SpartaGrants in a timely fashion
• Following naming conventions for SpartaGrants
• Ensuring that the title of the project, the sponsor, the start and end date are correct
• Ensuring that the statement of work (SOW) provides enough detail to help PASA understand the nature of the project to determine the appropriate agreement type 
• Requesting a preliminary number when award setup and acceptance is delayed

Modifying budgets

When possible, PIs and department research administrators should use the budget in SpartaGrants to update the budget. 

• Single speedtype: Use SpartaGrants to modify budgets requiring one speedtype.
• Multiple speedtypes: For awards with multiple speedtypes, use the PASA Budget Template. PASA created this template to standardize and reduce the administrative burden when requesting multiple speedtypes or changes to the budget of an awarded proposal. The PASA Budget Template has guidance for its use in the second tab of the spreadsheet and additional tabs with examples.

PASA Budget Template

Guidance for Requesting Preliminary Numbers

A preliminary account allows a PI to begin work for a sponsored project prior to the receipt of a notice of award (NOA) or a fully executed agreement under specific criteria. The establishment of a preliminary account will:

• Eliminate and/or reduce cost transfers and administrative burden
• Help ensure funds for a specific award period are used appropriately to eliminate the need for no-cost extensions
• Reduce the likelihood of an award period having more than 25% carry over of funding
• Enable PIs to continue work on ongoing projects that are in the process of being renewed
• Enable a PI to take advantage of and use pre-award spending, if approved by the sponsor
• Enable the PI to make large purchases with long lead times and to begin to hire additional personnel to work on an award
• It’s strongly recommended that DAs request preliminary numbers when appropriate. The RADAR Training site provides information to help determine when such a request is appropriate.

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