Chemical Education Today
Report
Proposal Preparation Aids at the NSF Web Site by Donald J. Wink I have spent some time in the last months explaining where the NSF Web site has relevant information for the science education community. But, of course, the NSF is best known for its financial support, through grants and contracts, of research and innovation. Grant programs are all accessed through a proposal process and, this month, I will explain where the Web site has information that may be helpful for people preparing a new proposal.
Getting Started In the April issue, I discussed the general structure of education-related sites. On the pages for each NSF division, you will find information about the grant programs that are available. These pages usually have information about how to contact NSF with questions, and it is very helpful to have a conversation with an NSF staff member if you are uncertain about where or how to send in your proposal. Once you have identified your idea and where to send it, the NSF has some very general Web pages to assist in the preparation of any proposal. The fundamental grants page is at http:// www.nsf.gov/home/grants.htm; there you will find links to much, but not all, of the relevant information. The official NSF Grant Proposal Guide is online at http://www.nsf.gov/bfa/cpo/gpg/start.htm. This document contains a lot of technical information that may be important if your institution does not have much experience with filing proposals at NSF. Information related to the administration of an award is contained in the Grant General Conditions (last revised December 1997) at http://www.nsf.gov/cgi-bin/getpub?nsf98gc1. You will have a choice of downloading the Conditions as a Microsoft Word or Adobe PDF format file. This contains helpful details on issues related to copyrights and grant-supported research.
Online Advice to Proposal Writers The merit review process employed by NSF means that each proposal is going to have to pass the judgment of peer reviewers. Until then, nothing is certain. But very important advice is available before the proposal is written or submitted. Even if you have your own personnel to assist with the particulars of proposal sub-
mission, the NSF Proposal Preparation section of the Grant Proposal Guide at http://www.nsf.gov/bfa/cpo/gpg/ch2.htm#2-12 may be very useful as a reference for organizing the proposal in a standard manner. The Division of Undergraduate Education includes its own advice within its Program Announcement and Guidelines. That particular section is located at http://www.ehr.nsf.gov/ehr/due/documents/general/9845/advice.htm. And very recently, the Division has issued a Guide for Proposal Writing, available at http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/1998/nsf9891/ nsf9891.htm. Finally, it may be enlightening to see what reviewers are given when they receive your proposal. A document containing the general criteria for merit review is posted online at http://www.nsf.gov/ bfa/cpo/gpg/ch3.htm#3-1. The Division of Undergraduate Education also has a description of the merit criteria at http://www.ehr.nsf.gov/ ehr/due/documents/general/9845/merit.htm.
Forms for NSF Proposals The body of an NSF proposal is prepared by the applicant, ideally following the guidelines that the NSF suggests. But proposals also contain several pages that must be done on NSF forms. The main page for the forms is at http://www.nsf.gov/bfa/cpo/forms/ start.htm. An essential help file is found at http://www.nsf.gov/bfa/ cpo/forms/helphin2.htm. The NSF proposal forms are available in Microsoft Word or Adobe Postscript format. The Word documents can be opened, and the blanks for relevant data can be filled in (these forms are made with protected fields; the Web page has information on deprotection if that is needed). The Postscript files actually give very nice-looking results but require some editing of a text file and a Postscript printer driver to work. Note that for the Division of Undergraduate Education, there is one additional form, Form 1295 or the “Project Data Form”. It is available as a Web page at http://www.ehr.nsf.gov/ehr/due/documents/general/9845/form1295.htm. This has to be printed out from the browser and then filled in. Donald J. Wink is in the Department of Chemistry, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL 60607;
[email protected].
JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu • Vol. 75 No. 8 August 1998 • Journal of Chemical Education
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