Managing Your Award
Sponsored research

Notify our office

Contact us to let us know you received the grant.

Project Data Sheet

Download and fill out the current year Project Data Sheet (NOT available through Cayuse 424)

• Attach the official award documentation sent by the sponsor
• Route for all required signatures and send them to our office
• OSPR will set up your award in Workday and provide the Award/Grant Worktags.

Grant Activity Report

This is available in Workday as the Manager Budgetary Balance Report.

Funding and invoicing process

As the PI, you are responsible for knowing how the granting agency will provide the grant award money. Although every grant is different, grant money typically comes in one of two ways:

1. At the beginning of the grant performance period (the check is in the mail!)
2. On a reimbursement basis after grant expenses have been incurred

If the grant is funded at the beginning of the performance period, a check will be mailed from the granting agency to the College directly, either to the PI, to the FLC Foundation, or the Controller’s Office. If the PI receives the grant check, it goes to the Senior Accountant in the Controller’s Office to be deposited. If it goes to the Foundation, the Senior Accountant will request it be transferred to the College.

If the grant is funded on a reimbursement basis, the Senior Accountant will work with the PI to prepare invoices and submit them to the funding agency as required in the grant agreement.

The award money does not need to be received by FLC before expenditures are made on the grant; however, the grant expenditures must be made per the approved grant agreement and budget. If the grant is multi-year, the PI can only expend funds that have been approved for each year in accordance with the grant terms – expenditures cannot be made with future year funding unless the granting agency has formally approved that future funding.

When the grant has been officially processed via the Project Data Sheet, the PI will receive an email from OSPR with the grant and award worktags to view the award in Workday. The grant worktag is required for any financial transactions in Workday to make expenditures using grant funds.

How to pay faculty and staff

Does the grant include salary dollars for you (as PI) or other faculty and staff members or wages/stipends to students/ research assistants?  

You must discuss this with OSPR and Human Resources to pay these individuals properly. Faculty are subject to academic year and summer salary limitations. Stipends for faculty may be appropriate in limited circumstances – such as discrete pieces of work or running workshops. These stipends also need to cover fringe benefits costs. 

Staff are expected to be charged to the project as a % of their salary for the effort allocated. 

Paying stipends to participants (e.g., those receiving training or attending workshops) needs to be handled carefully – please discuss this with OSPR.

How to pay a student or hourly employee

Students are usually paid hourly for limited work performed for projects. Students may be employed as salaried Research Assistants in certain circumstances. 

Does the grant include funds for a student worker or hourly employee? To pay these individuals appropriately, you must process these via Workday for each position.

• Be sure your grant has a budget and the available funding to pay the employee.
• Determine the hourly rate for the employee and the number of hours/days the person will work on the grant.
• Students are limited to working 20 hours per week or less during the academic year.  Hourly workers cannot be paid less than the current Colorado minimum wage.

How to make purchases

Does your grant include funds to make purchases or funding for travel expenses? If so, you must understand FLC’s procurement, travel policies, and procedures. Find this information through the Purchasing and Travel Office.

Know the terms of your award. Make sure you understand if and when the following perspectives apply to your project:

1. Project compliance: progress reporting and other project-related compliance, e.g., required conference attendance
2. Financial compliance:
   1. FLC requirements for spending grant award funds
   2. Allowable and non-allowable costs
3. Cost Share/Matching requirements: Or In-Kind Matching Form
4. Other budget restrictions: or Time and effort reporting
   The Federal Government requires that time distribution records be maintained for all employees whose salaries are paid in whole or in part with federal funds. The salaries and wages paid with grant program funds must be supported by actual hours worked. Once per year, OSPR will send the PI a time and effort certification for any faculty and staff working on the federal grant but not submitting timesheets to payroll/HR. The PI must understand the purpose of time and effort reporting and ensure that compensation costs are allowable and reasonable for the service rendered on the grant.  Services are considered valid if compensation for employees is consistent with that paid for similar work in the other activities of the non-Federal entity.
5. Research compliance:
   1. Human Subjects Research – IRB
   2. Working with Animals - IACUC
   3. Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR)
   4. Financial Conflicts of Interest (FCOI)

As the PI, you must comply with all reporting required for the grant award. The grant award documents will stipulate these requirements, when and how to submit reports, and what should be included. Typically, the PI is responsible for completing the non-financial reporting. The Senior Accountant will assist the PI with financial reporting.

All federally funded grants require a Federal Financial Report (FFR). Other granting agencies will notify the PI via email of reporting requirements and/or have an online platform for submitting reports.

Please contact our office, the Senior Accountant in the Controller’s Office, or the granting agency’s Program Officer to clarify report requirements associated with the grant award.

Reporting requirements may include:

• All grants require reporting at least annually
• May require a financial breakdown (prepared by the Senior Accountant in the Controller’s Office)
• May require that you submit a narrative report on project activities, benchmarks, or deliverables (ask us for guidance)
• Copies of all reports you file with the sponsor must also be submitted to the Controller’s Office

Moving expenses between accounts

Did expenses related to your grant get recorded to a different org or the wrong account? If the transaction has not yet been posted to the accounting system (Banner), please code your transaction directly to your grant org. If you purchased using an office administrator/grant coordinator’s P-Card, tell them which org and account you want the transaction recorded to.

Once transactions have been posted to Banner, you need to make a JV request to get the expenses moved. Start an email to jvrequest@fortlewis.edu. Please use the JV Request Form for the Requestor to Attach to the Email form to help you explain your request to the Controller's Office. Be sure to cc the email to ospr@fortlewis.edu. If you need guidance on completing the JV request for your grant, please contact the Office of Sponsored Programs and Research.

As closeout nears, the Senior Accountant in the Controller’s Office will:

• Notify you before the grant period ends with information on any funds remaining in the account
• Do final invoicing and zero out the account once all funds are expended
• Help you complete and submit final financial reporting as required by the sponsor