Online Submission Instructions

Please consult the Submission Guidelines before beginning your grant application.

Principal investigators should be prepared to enter basic contact and proposal information into the system screens. Be aware that you must be prepared to enter all of the basic information requested on the application screens the first time that you go through them because, with the exception of the fields in Steps 3 and 4, the system is not set up to allow you to later revise or add information. However, before making the intitial submission, you may go back and forth from screen to screen by using the "Previous step" and "Next step" buttons at the bottom of each screen. Note that once you click the "Submit" buttom on the "Step 4" screen, you will not be able to go back into the submission screens to enter information. If that is a problem for you, please contact Colin Swanson at the AMS at nsagrants@ams.org or or 1-800-321-4267, ext. 4096 or 401-455-4096.

Also, be aware that in order to save the information entered into the fields on the screens, you are required to upload at least the main body of the proposal (Description of Proposed Research), which does not have to be the final version as you will be able to upload revisions as needed. The system will not ask you to create a user account; however, you will be able to enter the system again as many times as you wish up until the deadline and revise the Proposal Info and upload either documents which you may not have submitted in the initial submission or revised documents. This is done through a secured link embedded in the confirmation e-mail that you will receive once you have successfully completed the initial submission; therefore, it is important that you save your confirmation email. Once you are done uploading all documents or their revisions, you should click the "Complete" button, but only do so when you are satisfied that all documents are the version that you wish the reviewers to see. The reviewers will only be able to view the most recently submitted documents.

You will be asked to provide information as you go through each screen. The Information requested on each screen is detailed below.

To begin your proposal submission, choose which type of proposal you wish to submit from the drop-down menu: Standard Grant; Young Investigator Grant; Senior Investigator Grant; Conferences, Workshops and Special Situations; or Research Experience for Undergraduates. Then indicate the following:

Number of PIs: Enter the number of PIs working on the proposed research. Please be aware that if you are doing the proposed research with a co-PI from a different institution, then each PI will have to apply and submit his/her proposal separately. If you are submitting a proposal with PIs from the same institution, then only one of the PIs needs to apply and submit the proposal. You will be asked to designate one PI as the corresponding PI.

For conference and REU proposals, the corresponding PI should belong to the institution that will receive the grant. All PIs should be listed, but only the corresponding PI need fill out the submission form.

Step 1: Basic proposal information

Title of Proposed Research: The title of the proposed research should be brief but properly descriptive and should use keywords suitable for indexing and retrieval. It should use alphabetical letters, and avoid symbols and mathematical or scientific notation.

Mathematics Subject Classification code(s): Enter at least one 5-digit MSC code that corresponds to the proposed research. You will be allowed to enter up to five 5-digit MSC codes, indicating the primary area of your proposed research, and up to five 5-digit MSC codes, indicating the secondary area of proposed research. At least one primary MSC code is required; secondary codes are optional.

Step 2: Contact information of the Principal Investigator(s)

Enter the basic contact information for each PI: e-mail address; first name (given name), middle name (not required) and last name (family name). Office phone and home phone (the home phone field is optional; but home phone numbers for the Principal Investigator(s) are very useful when the terms of the grant must be negotiated.) Enter your Institution name, Department name, and the mailing address of your department.

For proposals with more than one PI, please indicate which PI will be the corresponding PI by clicking the corresponding button labeled, "Click here if this PI is the corresponding PI".

Step 3: Additional Proposal Information

On this page you will need to enter additional proposal information, and the contact information for the Sponsored Research/Projects representative at your institution who is responsible for authorizing the submission of your proposal. The fields for which a PI must enter information differs between the research type proposals (Standard Grant, Young Investigator Grant, Senior investigator Grant) and the conference and workshop type proposals (Conferences, Workshops and Special Situations, Research Experience for Undergraduates). All fields are listed below—the fields that are specific to each of these two broad categories of proposals are indicated below. Fields that PIs are not required to fill in will be indicated as optional.

Primary area of proposed research: From the drop-down menu, choose one of the five research areas (you may choose only one area, so please choose the one that is most applicable to your proposed research): Algebra, Discrete Mathematics, Number Theory, Probability, Statistics.

Secondary area of proposed research: This is optional—if applicable, choose a secondary subject area (this will help both to assign your proposal to the correct panel for evaluation and find appropriate reviewers).

Event acronym (conference proposals only; optional): Enter the acronym, if applicable, that you use for your conference, workshop or REU.

Grant starting and end dates: The length of time for which support is requested should not exceed two years. The NSA MSP projects its budget for Fiscal Year 2014 to be approved between October and December 2013. Therefore, it is anticipated that grant awards will begin after January 2014, though Principal Investigators will be notified of their status for funding over the period between July and December, 2013. For those proposals that fall under the "Conferences, Workshops and Special Situations" category, the NSA MSP is aware that a few proposals will ask for funding in Spring 2013. This is to notify the PI that the NSA MSP will make every attempt to have your proposal reviewed in a timely manner; however, this does not guarantee that your proposal will be reviewed in time to fund your conference.

Funding requested: For research proposals enter the total funding requested from NSA for year 1 followed by that for year 2, e.g., $19,000 $20,000. For conference or REU proposals, enter the total funding requested from NSA.

PhD advisors: Optional for conference and REU proposals; required otherwise.

Post-doctoral mentors: Optional for conference and REU proposals; required otherwise.

Post-doctoral advisees: Optional for conference and REU proposals; required otherwise.

Research collaborators withing the past 48 months: Optional for conference and REU proposals; required otherwise.

Suggested reviewers/suggested non-reviewers (research proposals only; optional): The investigator may list up to five potential reviewers and non-reviewers. These suggestions will receive full consideration at the time of reviewer selection.

The following fields are for conference or REU proposals only:

Organizational endorsement and approval section: The corresponding PI will be asked to provide the e-mail address, full name, title, office phone and FAX numbers, and the postal address for the official authorized to endorse and approve the proposal.

Please note that organizational endorsement and approval is not required before the deadline because of the way the electronic system obtains the endorsement. Organizational endorsement is obtained in the following way: an e-mail with a secured link to your proposal will be sent to the e-mail address that you provided for your SPO officer. The secured link will allow your SPO officer to view your entire proposal and provide approval (if there is a problem and approval is not given, then you will be notified and allowed to make the necessary changes). In order for endorsement to be obtained, the PI must declare the proposal complete by clicking on the "Complete" button. Note that clicking the "Complete" button does not automatically generate and send e-mail to the designated SPO officer; rather, e-mails to SPO officers are normally sent from the electronic system on or soon after the Oct. 17 deadline. The PI should wait until he or she is satisfied that all documents are the version that the reviewers should see before clicking the "Complete" button. The reviewers will only be able to view the most recently submitted documents.

PIs should be prepared to submit PDF files of each separate part of the proposal listed below. Please note that only one file can be uploaded for each section, so for cases in which you have more than one PDF document for a section (for example, a budget page and a budget explanation page), you will need to create a single PDF document out of the separate files before uploading. For specific information on the content of each part, please consult the Submission Guidelines:

Step 4: Upload your proposal files

Summary

Description of Proposed Research

Cover Letter (optional)

Budget Page

Personnel

Bibliography

Facilities and Equipment Available

Proprietary Data

Other Sponsors

Confirmation of Indirect Rates

Submission and Proposal Status Once you click the "Submit" button, it will take a minute to upload your application to the server. You should receive a message on your web browser's screen indicating that your submission has been received, with a link to view the status of your proposal (you will also receive an acknowledgement e-mail with the same link, which you should save). The status page will include a link that will take you to a screen to upload more proposal sections or revisions of previously uploaded sections.

Once you have uploaded all proposal sections in their final version, you may go to the status page and click the "Complete" button. Do not click the "Complete" until you are satisfied that your submission is complete and is in the final version that you wish the reviewers to read as you will not be allowed to upload any more documents once you hit the "Complete" button.