Office of Sponsored Programs

NSF Career Proposal Support Letters Guidelines

The Office of Sponsored Programs announces procedures for submitting letters of support for NSF Career Proposals.  Currently CAREER proposals do not require cost sharing, but several departments within the University wish to provide institutional support for Career awards. 

This is certainly an option, but the Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP) is requesting that you not quantify this support in the body of the proposal or the support letters that accompany the proposal. 

Per policy 3245 all committed (mandatory as well as committed voluntary) cost sharing must be adequately documented in the university’s records and meet allowable cost share requirements including internal VT requirements (i.e., Form A). Office of Management and Budget also state that mandatory and voluntary committed cost sharing must be properly documented for cost accounting purposes.   If dollar amounts or percent of effort is listed in the budget justification, technical section or support letters it becomes necessary to track these expenses in our accounting system.  Not calling it cost sharing does not alleviate the University’s responsibility for documentation. 

In the PDF below are suggested sample paragraphs that may be used in your support letters to indicate your commitment to the individual but does not require the University to track the commitment.