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Dear Colleagues:

Effective January 29, 2018, NSF will implement changes in FastLane and Research.gov to support the following policy updates in the Proposal & Award Policies & Procedures Guide (PAPPG) (NSF 18-1) and to run updated Budget Justification page limit automated compliance checks in FastLane:

Standard Collaborators and Other Affiliations Template Implementation:

• The revised PAPPG (NSF 18-1) incorporates the standard Collaborators and Other Affiliations (COA) template that has been in pilot phase in FastLane since April 2017.
• FastLane system instructions will be updated in accordance with the new policy.
• Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) on the COA template are available at https://nsf.gov/bfa/dias/policy/coa.jsp.

Budget Justification Page Limitation Increase:

• The Budget Justification page limitation will increase from three pages to five pages.
• To align with the new policy, FastLane will run an automated compliance check for the Budget Justification page limitation across several proposal types and will generate an error or warning when the submission validation compliance check is not met.
• Compliance checks are run during “Check Proposal,” “Forward to SPO,” and “Submit Proposal.” The complete list of FastLane automated compliance checks effective January 29, 2018, is available at https://www.nsf.gov/bfa/dias/policy/autocheck/compliancechecks_jan18.pdf.

New “Substitute Negotiator” Associated Document for Change of Principal Investigator (PI) Requests:

• A new “Substitute Negotiator” Associated Document will be available in FastLane’s Notifications and Requests module when a “Change of PI” request is made (e.g., to be utilized in cases where a former employee or Intergovernmental Personnel Act (IPA) is being reappointed as a PI or Co-PI to an award they were previously involved with).

New “Other Request” Type:

• A new “Other Request” type will be added to Research.gov’s Notifications and Requests module. This request will be reviewed and approved by the NSF Program Officer.

New Award Abstract Text:

• In connection with NSF’s transparency and accountability efforts for award abstracts, the Foundation will add the following final paragraph to all award abstracts for awards with start dates of March 1 or later: “This award reflects NSF’s statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation’s intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.”

Note about Proposal File Updates (PFU):

The automated compliance checks also apply when a PFU is performed on a proposal. The compliance checks will be run on all sections of the proposal, regardless of which section was updated during the PFU. Proposers should be aware that if a proposal was previously submitted successfully, a PFU performed on the proposal will be prevented from submission if the proposal does not comply with the compliance checks in effect at the time.

We encourage you to share this information with your colleagues. To learn about all the changes to the PAPPG (NSF 18-1), be sure to view the latest webinar.

For IT system-related questions, please contact FastLane User Support at 1-800-673-6188 or [log in to unmask]. Policy-related questions should be directed to [log in to unmask].

Regards,

The FastLane Team at the National Science Foundation

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