I would like to collect information as to how other universities have
been responding to NASA Quality Assurance Assessments.

The purpose of the assessments is "to evaluate critical processes and
identify potential risks to NASA programs".  Unfortunately, the measure
is the application of AS9100 (the industry standard for aerospace
manufacturing), even though all the research contracts reviewed do not
invoke it (which is why NASA is very careful to call it an "assessment",
and not an audit).  The result is a finding that the university is
non-conforming to the stringent requirements of AS9100, and thus
assumedly not qualified to receive NASA contracts involving hardware
(which in our case means one-of-a-kind experiments for space craft).
The fact that the university performed in complete conformance to
contract requirements and to the full satisfaction of the sponsor is
ignored in the process.

Obviously, the strongest response would have been to deny access for
the assessments (while still welcoming audits), but that wasn't
considered to be appropriately responsive, and NASA was very coy about
revealing the parameters until the process was under way.  Are there any
universities that rebuffed the request to perform such an assessment?

For the universities that entertained the assessments--how did you
respond to the (dismal) findings?  There is concern here that we not
appear unresponsive to quality assurance issues; however, if the
application of AS9100 to contracts that did not include it is
unchallenged, the negative findings will be seen as essentially correct.
 Are there institutions that challenged the process as patently
incorrect?

The implementation of a quality assurance program that conforms to
AS9100 would require a considerable investment in time and money that
probably couldn't be recovered through overhead, and would therefore
have to either be charged directly to the contract (which is typically
for a single instrument package) or borne by the institution.  Has any
university chosen these alternatives?

Thank you for your help.

George Turnbull
Compliance Administrator
University of Maryland
Office of Research, Administration, and Advancement
Lee Building, Room 3103
College Park, MD 20742
301-405-6278
Fax 301-314-9569

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