APPLYING FOR AN EXTERNAL GRANT: PROPOSAL SUBMISSION

This is a brief overview for those not acquainted with the grant submission process. Funders typically have specific guidelines about the proposal submission process. In addition, Georgetown University has its own guidelines.

PRIVATE FOUNDATION GRANTS

The Office of Corporate & Foundation Relations manages the University’s interactions with non-governmental grantmakers. To coordinate multiple funding requests within the law school and within the larger university and ensure that a grant is acceptable under university guidelines, , application to foundations must be approved via a clearance process. Before pursuing application to the funders, please contact us via email for guidance and assistance.

All foundation grant proposals must be submitted to Georgetown’s Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP) for review through the TRACS system, described below, before being submitted to the foundation. The relevant offices within the Law Center, including CFR, will review the proposal through this integrated system, along with the OSP. Allow at least ten business days for interoffice review.

The Office of Sponsored Programs announced that, effective over the summer of 2014, the TRACS system will be used for routing proposals submitted by Main Campus and Law Center faculty and University Services personnel. The TRACS system is part of the Interneer platform that is used for electronic general disclosures required by the Conflict of Interest Policy. As with the OSP Proposal Routing System, routing will be based on your home department so faculty who route their proposals through multiple departments have been pre-programmed so that the proposal will route through the department and routing scheme where their recent grants were housed.

Principal investigators and reviewers may log in to the TRACS system using their Net ID and password. The system can also be accessed through the OSP website.

Please note that the TRACS system requires investigators and others responsible for the design, conduct and reporting of the research to complete their Study Specific Disclosure Forms (SSDFs) as part of the routing process. This is a change from the OSP system where SSDFs were completed outside of the system and included as an attachment.

APPLYING FOR A GOVERNMENT GRANT

To submit grant applications to government funders, you will need to work directly with the Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP) at the Georgetown University main campus rather than with the Foundation Relations office.

OSP requires much more time to review a proposal intended to obtain government sponsorship. However, in some cases with federal grants, you will need to work closely with OSP on various elements of the submission process (e.g., using required online application systems such as grants.gov). For this you should contact OSP earlier in the process, at least a month in advance of the funder deadline.