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Pre-Award

About Us

Welcome to the Pre-Award unit of Grants & Contracts Administration (GCA)! Our unit is committed to serving as the central resource for faculty and staff who are seeking external funding for their research and other sponsored programs. Our mission is to provide administrative support to Principal Investigators (PIs) in their pursuit of sponsored funding while ensuring compliance with University of North Texas (UNT) policies as well as federal, state, and private sponsor regulations, terms, and conditions.

Pre-Award services and processes are designed to help facilitate the overall proposal submission process while balancing the need for institutional and sponsor regulatory compliance.

All proposals for sponsored program funding, whether new or continuing, must be processed through the GCA-Pre-Award unit for formal UNT approval and signature prior to submission to external sponsors. 

PIs that have identified a funding opportunity that they would like to pursue, should submit a Grants & Contracts Specialist Request form to alert GCA Preaward of the upcoming submission. A GCA Pre-Award Specialist will respond to your request within 1-2 business days with your internal GRAMS Funding Proposal and further instructions.
 

Our Services

  • Assist with ensuring that applications or proposals for funding are prepared in accordance with sponsor application guidelines
  • Provide Authorized Official approvals and submit proposals for sponsored research, training and other programs through various official web portals 
  • Serve as a business official/liaison with sponsors for proposal submissions
  • Support PIs by providing information, interpretations and guidance for proposal preparation and submission
  • Contact and collaborate with partner institutions to secure all necessary subcontract documentation or coordinate collaborative submissions as needed
  • Assist with budget development
  • Review proposals for compliance with sponsor guidelines, federal regulations, cost accounting standards, and institutional policies for research
  • Serve as the source of information for proposal submissions and various sponsored projects topics
  • Prepare and provide education and training resources on issues impacting Pre-Award aspects of sponsored programs
  • Coordinate review and acceptance of awards
  • Review grant awards terms & conditions and coordinate for any needed authorized signature before accepting the award
  • Ensure internal compliance approvals are in place for incoming awards
  • Review and submit Just-in-Time (JIT) requests
  • Submit Programmatic Progress reports
  • Initiate no-cost extensions
  • Coordinate PI Change requests
  • Maintain internal records for accurate reporting of proposals

Internal submission deadline  

The applicant should contact the Grants and Contracts Administration (GCA) well in advance of the proposal submission deadline. 

Assignments of a Grants & Contracts Specialist are made through the online Grants & Contracts Specialist Request form. A completed request form is emailed to GCA's Pre-Award Team. A GCA Specialist is assigned to the PI's proposal and will respond directly to the PI on the proposal submission to let them know the next steps and will work with appropriate college and department personnel to ensure proposal submission success. 

  • The PI should submit the GCS request at least two weeks prior to the submission deadline for non-collaborative proposal submissions. For collaborative submissions that include subawards, the GCS Request should be submitted 6 weeks or more in advance of the target deadline.
  • The PI should route the entire proposal, ready to submit, with the appropriate internal documents via GRAMS at least 6 business days prior to the submission deadline to ensure the timely review of the complete proposal, including the proposal budget for compliance with agency guidelines (RFP) and UNT policy.
  • Close attention should be paid to whether the deadline date is a received by date or a postmarked by date.

Note: Although agencies may have deadlines in the evening or on the weekend, Grants & Contracts Administration does not conduct business after 5pm, on weekends, or during stated UNT holidays.

Institutional Information

GCA maintains information on UEI, Tax ID, Institutional addresses, Congressional District, etc. that may be required for your proposal submission. UNT is the applicant on proposal submissions, therefore institutional legal name and addresses should be used where needed. For a list of standard UNT information for proposals and awards, please visit the Institutional Information page

​Routing for Approvals

 

Other Division of Research & Innovation (DRI) Units

GCA Post-Award Unit

GCA Pre-Award works closely with colleagues in the Post-Award unit to support faculty with incoming awards. For more information regarding GCA Post-Award Services, visit the Post-Award webpage.

Research Development 

DRI's Research Development unit offers a variety of services. Additional information regarding these services and information regarding available proposal managers can be found on the DRI Research Development webpage.

Faculty, staff and students are encouraged to use the institutional funding opportunity search tool, PIVOT, to identify sources of funding. For more information and additional resources, please visit DRI Funding Opportunities page.

Research Commercial Agreements (RCA)

GCA Pre-Award and Post-Award teams work closely with colleagues in Research Commercial Agreements to support faculty with incoming awards. RCA reviews, negotiates and accepts various funding agreements, including contracts and subcontracts that support sponsored projects, as well as CDAs, DUAs, and MTAs. For more information regarding RCA and the services they provide, please visit the RCA webpage

Research Integrity & Compliance (RIC)

Research Integrity & Compliance provides guidance and assistance to researchers in the areas of Human Subjects and Institutional Review Board (IRB), Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC), Institutional Biosafety (IBC), Conflict of Interest (COI), Export Controls, and Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR). For more information regarding RIC, please visit the RIC webpage.