My answer is much the same as Mary Watson's:

 We are here to help, not hinder.  We have never not submitted a proposal.
We have come mighty close, however, and I constantly remind PIs (in e-mails,
in workshops, in the office) that our policy asks for proposals to be in our
office, completed, 24 hours before the submission time.  I also remind them
that the only thing we can guarantee in this business is that if a proposal
does not arrive at the funder's on time, it won't be funded.  I illustrate
with an example (the most recent of which is a recent NSF submission: that
day all my staff but one was ill, at 4:30 my proposal coordinator was too
sick to stay any longer.  Everything for the NSF proposal was uploaded into
Fastlane except for the narrative.  She said she'd submit from home.  At
4:50, she called me and said that she couldn't get in to Fastlane, and I'd
have to do it.  Mind you, I DON'T KNOW HOW. Luckily, she walked me through
it.  At 4:57 I hit the submit button!) Then I say to faculty, "Don't put
yourself through that!" I also tell faculty that in case of a fire drill, I
will not keep my staff in the office to submit a proposal. And I reserve the
right to pull the proposal if it is not correct or violates policy.

-----Original Message-----
From: Research Administration List [mailto:xxxxxx@HRINET.ORG]On Behalf
Of McCann, John
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2004 1:15 PM
To: xxxxxx@HRINET.ORG
Subject: [RESADM-L] A Plea for Your Experience in Enforcing Grant
Submission Deadline s

Our business office is currently in the process of developing a policy to
enforce lead time requirements for approval signatures which would - in
effect - lengthen our internal grants approval process and impose a grants
submission deadline.  I think such deadlines are unenforcable and
undesirable.  The job of our grants office is to facilitate grants
submission, not impose barriers - and PIs have major time investments in
grant proposals.  While we specify that PIs should allow at least seven
working days for internal reviews - and we yelp at late submissions - we
always submit viable proposals.

I know that the list has discussed this subject in the past, and I've found
those e-mails, but I'd really appreciate a large number of you briefly
answering these three questions and providing the names of your
institutions:

1.  Does your institution enforce grants submissions deadlines?

2.  Why or why not?

Thank you........

John McCann, M.P.A., Ph.D.
Academic Grants Manager
Office of the Academic Vice President and Provost
The Evergreen State College
2700 Evergreen Parkway NW
Olympia, WA 98505

E-mail: xxxxxx@evergreen.edu
Phone: 360-867-6045
Fax: 360-867-6745

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