Survey Question 3

What comments or feedback of you have for OSP that you think are pertinent to this discussion?

• I think you are doing a great job. Keep up the good work.

• I would like the SPA to contact us directly when projects are due. SPAs I have worked with have been great! However, it gets confusing when different SPAs do different things for one project.

• You're doing well. EIPRS and Cayuse are good. I like having one primary person to deal with. I'm able to develop a relationship that is meaningful. But, having a backup would be good.

• I know you all are swamped and need more SPAs. But electronic information and facts that are consistent from website to website to EIPRS to URED financial types would help. Some of input needed is not obvious. Also, new PIs need training in person - not lots of docs on website. Encourage departments to assign mentors to new faculty.

• Proposal and budget review take too long at the dept/college/SPA level. Too many employees at the same level of expertise are reviewing the proposals and budgets.

• Work on electronic form more. There are still times when it is saving that I can make coffee between actions.

• It's obvious that OSP is going thru another round of changes. One would wonder why this is happening so often.

• Please continue to include PI geographical location data so research efforts can be identified by region.

• A recurring frustration in working with OSP is the lack of consistency. Depending upon who is delegated responsibility (sometimes several different people for one part of a grant process), or the frequently changing interpretations of the office, how a grant or process is handled will change several times before the submission and/or post award activity is complete. This is both a waste of valuable time and resources. There have been many instances, after a great deal of time and effort, where a process comes full circle back to how it was originally put forth by the PI only after a frustrating process of inconsistency and ambiguity takes it in another direction. This not only hinders a PIs ability (and desire) to secure and seek funding, but it also makes it appear that personnel are not well trained or making it up as they go along.

• I am confused by this question. Which discussion?

• With NSF going to a single year submission for many programs, SPA workload during the holidays will be very high.

• NA

• A discussion of post award procedures is needed. The biggest challenge is to make changes to grants already granted. It seems very complicated to make even small changes to grants.

• I have a lot of comments but would like to know how they are handled before stating them.

• None at this time.

• It seems that every time OSP reorganizes, we end up losing those with the most understanding of our specific grant.

• Changing the organizations of the SPAs is not the issue with OSP in my opinion. OSP is not focused on customer service, but seems to be more focused on revenue generation. It is frustrating when it is a struggle every time a proposal is submitted either because something has changed or there is a re-interpretation of current regulations. This is detrimental to those of us that are trying to write multiple proposals, but are at times hesitant because of having to then work with OSP.

  OSP have some great staff - wonderful to work with. Restructuring makes a lot of sense - but of all offices on campus this is one of the most short-staffed and they have a critical function. Please consider adequate staffing to ensure that OSP continue to be one of the most vibrant and courteous offices on campus.

• None.

• I am impressed with the service oriented approach by the SPAs. The challenge is for PIs to deal with the myriad of issues that relate to compliance, and the many approvals on multi investigator proposals.

• It would be nice to have regular meetings with our SPAs so that we can keep abreast of current developments in OSP and so they can have a better connection with our in-house functions and processes.

• It is a little challenging each time you have a new SPA to work with. Having some consistency is extremely valuable.

• The EIPRS still needs some work. It is not obvious when going into the system how one is to do different tasks.

• My only concern is consistency.

• To me flexibility w.r.t. due dates are most important. We spend a lot of effort and time, including weekends etc., and I cannot relate to lectures about "why have you not done this before". Please trust us, if we could have, we would have. I find this type issue very very frustrating and counterproductive. More Common Sense and flexibility: At this point in time I will NOT go through OSP for white papers anymore after I have been forced to spend precious time on exact budgets that were NOT required and I lost time to do the basic work on the white papers. This happened with three white papers and I will not subject myself to more of this nonsense. Most of my experiences with OSP were frustrating and most of my colleagues have similar experiences.

• I would prefer to work with the same SPA on all my proposals (with the same backup SPA). During hectic time I would not mind being assigned to a different SPA to even out workload. Efficiency can be achieved by decreasing the number of SPAs and other staff involved in each proposal.

• I think more assistance is needed for Post Award. Vicki is incredible, but she needs more help.

• Thanks for asking!

• Have already made them.

• The most important thing is knowledgeable, accurate SPAs who respond quickly to questions.

  The most critical thing is to have qualified help available in a timely fashion who will assist you in meeting deadlines. As long as all of the SPAs know the ropes of the programs I am submitted to then who assists me is not a big deal.

• I would like to have to deal with one SPA and a back-up assigned by College or Dept. If you break it up by the last name of the faculty, I would possibly need to work with several SPAs. It is difficult enough having to deal with 4 - 5 OSP employees on one project depending on what I am trying to accomplish.

• Be flexible about compliance, as not all projects need/require/want the level of oversight applied by OSP to every project.

• I know that OSP is swamped. This is more of a post award issue, but to be honest I have NO idea who you are supposed to contact now on which subject. I liked having just one person to contact if I needed anything from your department. I guess this was during cradle to grave.

• Too often as PIs we feel OSP is frustrating our attempts to do our job as researchers. Things are better than they used to be with more materials posted online that we need but the demands of proposal writing do not make it possible to conform to OSP's idea of what our schedule should be. In the end, OSP and the rest of the administration is here to facilitate the faculty to do their jobs, whether it be teaching, scholarship or service, not the other way around.

• It seems it would be just as hard for the SPA to learn the little details of the PI and/or college as it would be for the PI to have different SPA, possibly, each time a proposal was generated.

• Need greater communication on who to talk to about your pre- and post- award. Is it possible to have the same person? That way they get to know you and the grant better. We often have to send information several times since it gets misplaced between the two sides.