Limited Submission Procedure

When a Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) limits the number of submissions by an individual, school/college, or university, the following procedure will apply:

1. The Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP) will post limited submissions that it identifies on its website (See Newsletter/Grant Updates). The announcements will contain the following:

   This is a limited submission and only (number here) can be submitted by Murray State University, a college/school, or department. You must contact OSP if you intend to submit to this announcement. (OSP will not setup an internal review until the number of PIs informing OSP that they intend to submit exceeds the limit set by the agency.)

2. In all cases, whether identified by OSP or not, Principal Investigators (PIs) intending to submit to a limited submission FOA have an affirmative duty inform OSP and MUST contact OSP.

3. If the FOA limits the number of submissions by an individual as a principal investigator, co-investigator or collaborator, it is the individual’s responsibility to not exceed the agency limit. Individually limited submissions will not be posted by the Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP).

4. If the FOA limits the number of submissions by college or school, the Dean of that college or school will set the procedure and render a decision as to which PI(s) will be allowed to submit a proposal.

5. If the FOA limits the number of submissions by Department, the Department Chair will follow the procedure set by the college or school in consultation with the Dean.

6. In cases that involve PIs from different colleges, the Dean of each college (or his/her designee) will be involved in an internal review, assisted with faculty whose expertise in the area is considered beneficial to making a decision on which proposal is stronger, including a preference if the proposal is a resubmission that received a strong score. This mechanism will be coordinated by OSP. PIs will submit a proposal to be no longer than 3 pages which shall include:

   1. The names and colleges (or other universities) of all key personnel in the proposal and whether they are eligible
   2. A brief synopsis of the work proposed
   3. The budget for the proposed work

7. In all cases where an internal competition is required, the internal competition will be set as far in advance of the agency deadline as possible to allow the winner(s) of the competition time to prepare the submission. Where the limited submissions are known and reoccurring (such as the National Science Foundation Major Research Instrumentation Grant), the internal competition will be set in advance.

8. Once the limit of PIs for an FOA is selected, any other PI who later wishes to submit will not be allowed to do so.

9. A PI selected for a limited submission must submit the proposal to the agency within the cycle selected. If a selected PI later decides not to submit, that PI must inform OSP that they will not be submitting as soon as the decision is made so that other potential PIs may submit. The fact that a selected PI elected not to submit his/her proposal within the cycle will be considered should that PI wish to submit to that limited program in the future.

10. Where the limited submission is not one flagged by OSP and no PI notifies OSP that they are submitting in advance, an internal competition will be conducted with the full proposals if there is time to recruit reviewers and schedule a meeting. If a competition cannot be scheduled, the first PI contacting OSP will be allowed to submit.