Glossary

A

B

The Bayh-Dole Act created a uniform patent policy among the many federal agencies that fund research, enabling small businesses and non-profit organizations, including universities, to retain title to inventions made under federally-funded research programs, most consequently, enabled universities to retain title to innovation and spearhead patent and licensing new discoveries.

Biographical sketch is an outline for senior personnel, as identified by NSF, that includes an individual’s education and training, their appointments and positions, and other useful information that allows NSF to assess how qualified an individual is to conduct proposed activities.

C

Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI) is a program dedicated to providing high quality, peer reviews, web-based educational courses in research, responsible conduct of research, research administration, ethics and regulatory oversight for the research community.

Conflict of Commitment may exist when an individual has difficulty balancing the effort necessary to perform their job duties while engaging in additional activities that may or may not be related to their job.

conflict of interest (COI) may exist when an investigator engages in an activity or circumstance that has the potential to bias the design, conduct or reporting of results of research or technology.

contract or contract research occurs when a request is made by industry or a government agency for a specified project to carry out identified objectives.

contractor is an entity or individual that the non-federal entity uses for the purposes of obtaining goods or services. This is usually a procurement relationship.

cooperative agreement is similar to a grant, but is distinguished by the involvement of the awarding federal agency or pass through entity carrying out the activity. In a grant, the federal government more strictly maintains an oversight and monitoring role. In a cooperative agreement, federal employees participate more closely in performing the program.

D

Direct costs are directly associated with completing grant or contract work. The direct charges that are assigned to grant and contract projects do not account for other costs that are absorbed by the University.

E

F

Financial Conflict of Interest (FCOI) means a Significant Financial Interest that could directly and significantly affect the design, conduct, or reporting of NIH-­‐funded research.

An FOA is a Funding Opportunity Announcement; it is a description of grant funding made available. It is primarily used by government agencies and is typically accompanied by a description and activity code.

G

grant, or sponsored research, is funding that is most frequently received in a competitive application process. Generally, grants are much more flexible than contracts.

H

I

Indirect costs are charged to grants and contracts to help recover expenses that cannot be easily identified with any specific project but are necessary to meet the requirements of the project and to offset the true costs of doing business.  Examples of these costs include grant administration, facilities operations, departmental administration, the services of procurement and purchasing, travel accounting, accounts payable and human resources office support. The indirect cost rate is the mechanism used to fairly determine how to allocate these expenses to projects.

The Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee, or IACUC, ensures all that all live animals used in research and teaching receive ethical and human treatment and care.

The Institutional Review Board, or IRB, protects the rights and welfare of human subjects recruited to participate in research activities conducted under the auspices of Eastern Washington University.

Investigator’s Institutional Responsibilities means an investigator’s professional responsibilities on behalf of the institution, and as defined by the institution in its policy on financial conflicts of interest, which may include for example: activities such as research, research consultation, teaching, professional practice, institutional committee memberships, and service on panels such as Institutional Review Boards or Data and Safety Monitoring.

J

K

L

logical model a popular tool used to conceptualize the intended results for a specific project. Funders often request a logic model to help determine the effectiveness of a program.

An LOI may be a letter of inquiry, letter of interest or letter of intent. A funder may request one type of this letter prior to submission of a full proposal. It is a brief description of the project, usually one to two pages. Some funders have a required format for LOIs, others ask for a general summary in the applicant’s format of choice.  Some LOIs may be used by the funding agency to gauge the nature of the potential applicant pool while others may be reviewed and used as the basis for narrowing the number of applicants invited to submit full proposals to a particular funding competition.

M

N

NIFA is the National Institute of Food and Agriculture

NIH is the National Institute of Health

Non-disclosure agreement (NDA), aka confidentiality agreement is a contract in which the terms obligate the signing parties to not disclose confidential information they have shared or need to share with each other as necessary part of conducting business.

NSF is the National Science Foundation

O

The Office of Grants and Research Development (OGRD) full service sponsored programs office that assists with many aspects of the grant and research process, including all stages of pre-award grant development and submission, regulatory compliance requirements and post-award administration. The OGRD also facilitates contracts that constitute “works for hire” with the university, assistance with sub-award or sub-recipient agreements and non-disclosure and materials transfer agreements if they are necessary for a grant or a contract.

P

PA is a Program Announcement. Most often used by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), it identifies areas of increased priority and/or emphasis on particular funding mechanisms for a specific area of science.

project director (PD) manages a grant-funded program such as a TRiO or a Private Foundation grant while a principal investigator (PI) manages a grant funded research project that investigates a hypothesis. The two terms are often used interchangeably.

A Program Solicitation is a mechanism most often used by the National Science Foundation (NSF) that announces various competitions for proposals in specific program areas of interest.

Q

R

Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) is the practice of scientific investigation with integrity, and includes all research and scholarship associated with the mission of Eastern Washington University. Examples include, but are not limited to: approvals for human subjects in research, animal care and use, use of recombinant or synthetic nucleic acids and biologicals, development of intellectual property, etc.

An RFP is a Request for Proposal, similarly, an RFA is a Request for Application. Various agencies, including federal agencies, make grant announcements via an RFP or RFA. An RFP offers detailed guidelines for a specific proposal along with deadline and submission information.

S

Significant Financial Interest (SFI) is a financial interest consisting of one or more of the following interests of the investigator (and those of the investigator’s spouse and dependent children) that reasonably appears to be related to the investigator’s institutional responsibilities.

subaward is an award that is provided by the pass-through entity (EWU) to another entity, a subrecipient (the entity that received the subaward), to carry out part of the federal award. A subrecipient is responsible for following the terms and conditions set forth in the federal award.

subcontract is a legal instrument that the non-federal entity (EWU) uses to purchase the services needed to carry out part of the project or program under the Federal award and can be used for either a subrecipient or a contractor.

T

technology transfer is a formal transfer of rights to use and commercialize new discoveries and innovations resulting from scientific research to another party, which has expanded to include duties such as corporate engagement, internal development of inventions, new company formation and overall economic development.

Theory of change is a big picture roadmap of outcomes, a casual framework of how and why a change process will happen in a particular context.

U

The USDA is the United States Department of Agriculture

V

W

X

Y

Z