NIH eSubmission Item of Interest – March 30, 2007
New Grants.gov 2007 Solution Coming Soon
We’ll have to wait just a little while longer for the new Grants.gov 2007 solution that incorporates Adobe-based forms and Google search functionality. Last week, Grants.gov provided a deployment update indicating the timeline has shifted by a little over a month (update included below). We know many applicants (especially our Mac friends) are anxious for the new solution, but we support the delay to provide adequate testing time. Given the complexity of rolling out forms changes, it is important to get this right.
Our first opportunity to see the new forms will come next week. I’d love to be able to tell you our strategy for moving to the new forms, but until we have an opportunity to play with the new forms, we simply can’t provide those details. Once our plans are finalized we will communicate them through the NIH Guide for Grants & Contracts, the eSubmission listservs, our website and in presentations.
So, sit tight and keep doing what you’re doing with the PureEdge forms. We’ll keep you posted as our plans unfold.
DEPLOYMENT UPDATE
From: Nicolosi, Terry (HHS/ASRT)
Sent: Friday, March 23, 2007 4:39 PM
Subject: Status of the Grants.gov Deployment
Grants Executive Board:
Per the March Grants Executive Board meeting, the Grants.gov new system platform deployment is incorporating additional internal and end user testing to the deployment schedule to ensure risk mitigation and quality assurance is incorporated into the deployment process. This additional testing is to reduce impacts to our end users, therefore the revised schedule is as follows: week of March 26 complete Grants.gov Independent Verification and Validation (IV&V) testing and the Department of Education's Section 508 lab testing with the final build to the system on Saturday 3/31/2007. The three pilot Federal agency testers, NEH, NIH and ED will begin testing the week of 4/2/2007, and upon completion will be opened up to all Federal grant agencies and the three applicant testers prior to the full deployment to production the first week of May.
The Grants.gov PMO appreciates the support and patience as we continue to complete the deployment of the new platform.
Terry Nicolosi
Grants.gov Program Management Office
Terry.Nicolosi@hhs.gov
Organization Name – Noteworthy Grants.gov FAQ
Just in case you don’t spend your free time browsing FAQs on the Grant.gov or NIH eSubmission websites, I thought I’d bring this specific FAQ to your attention.
Question: What is the maximum amount of characters I can use in the following fields: "Enter name of Organization" on the Research & Related Budget - Section A & B form and "Organization Name" on the Research & Related Senior/Key Person (Expanded) form?
Answer: You can only use 60 or less characters in the above form fields. There is an anomaly in the PureEdge forms that allows you to enter up to 75 characters, but it actually gets cut to 60 characters and this causes processing delays when validating at Grants.gov.
Why is this particular FAQ so important? Grants.gov staff must take an action on each of the applications affected by this issue in order for the processing to complete. Most of the time applicants wouldn’t even notice the action taking place behind the scenes, but you can see how this extra step could lead to delays during large submission dates (like NIH’s recent R01 deadlines). Since fixing the issue in the PureEdge forms would require applicants to download and transfer data to updated form packages, it was decided to address the issue in the new Adobe forms. In the meantime, keep those organization names down to 60 characters to avoid delays.
Sheri Cummins
Communications Coordinator
NIH Electronic Submission of Grant Applications
Contractor, LTS