Summary of Significant Changes
This amendment to the Grant Proposal Guide implements a new electronic signature capability for all proposals submitted to NSF. This new capability would require receipt of electronic signatures from Authorized Organizational Representatives only. As part of this new process, organizations will be required to designate, within FastLane, the individual(s) authorized to sign on behalf of the organization. Further instructions regarding this process are available on the FastLane website at: http://www.fastlane.nsf.gov. The specific changes are as follows:
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Chapter I --- Section B, Proprietary or Privileged Information, has been revised to reflect that Proprietary or Privileged Information, if included as a separate statement, should now be sent to the FastLane address specified in the GPG.
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Chapter I --- Section E.1, Special Instructions for Proposals that Contain High Resolution Graphics and Other Graphics Where Exact Color Representations are Required for Proper Interpretation by the Reviewer, has been updated to state that only the first page of the proposal Cover Sheet needs to be submitted with the color copies of the proposal.
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Chapter I --- Section E.2, Submission Instructions, eliminates the requirement to provide a signed paper proposal Cover Sheet. PIs and co-PIs are no longer required to sign the proposal Cover Sheet. All required proposal certifications will be provided electronically by the Authorized Organizational Representative.
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Chapter II --- Section B.1, Proposal Pagination Instructions, has been clarified to state that each section of the proposal that is uploaded as a file (whether PDF or a word processing file) must be individually paginated before upload to FastLane.
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Chapter II --- Section C, Cover Sheet for Proposal to the National Science Foundation, has been revised to eliminate the requirement to provide a signed paper proposal Cover Sheet. By electronically signing the proposal, the Authorized Organizational Representative will be providing all of the required proposal certifications. This section also states that Lobbying Disclosures (SF LLL), when applicable, should be accompanied by a copy of the proposal Cover Sheet and sent to the NSF Proposal Processing Unit.
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Chapter II --- Section C.3, Project Description, has been changed to specify that Project Descriptions must be submitted as a PDF file or a word processing file capable of being converted through FastLane into a PDF file for use by NSF.
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Chapter II --- Section C.6.a.(iii), Confidential Budgetary Information, has been changed to specify that the instructions in Chapter I, Section B should be followed when submitting Confidential Budgetary Information Statements.
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Chapter II --- Section C.6.f.(v), Subawards, removes the requirement that subawardee organizations must provide signed budgets. Submission of a paper budget signed by the Authorized Organizational Representative of the subawardee organization is no longer necessary.
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Chapter II --- Section C.11.b.(ii), Simultaneous Submission of Proposals from Different Organizations, has been updated with new FastLane submission procedures for collaborative proposals which involve simultaneous submission of proposals from different organizations.
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Chapter III --- Section C, Revisions to Proposals Made During the Review Process, has been supplemented with language to specify that a signed paper copy of the budget is not required when submitting revised budgets to NSF.
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Chapter V --- Section B.4, Supplemental Funding, has been revised to specify that Supplemental Funding requests can now be submitted completely electronically via FastLane. A signed paper copy of the supplement budget is no longer required to be submitted to NSF.
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Chapter VI --- Section B, Prior Approval Requirements, updates the listing of postaward actions that cannot be completed electronically via FastLane. This includes: Change of PI, Transfer of a Significant Portion of the Project Effort (Subaward), and PI Transfers. With implementation of the electronic signature capability Foundation-wide, NSF is in the process of converting these remaining paper processes to electronic formats. Further information on processing of these transactions will be provided, when available.
