Leveraging Knowledge: Collaborating with the Sponsored Projects Administration to Support National Science Foundation Researchers New to the SciENcv Biographical Sketch Requirement

Background: The National Science Foundation announced in June 2019 it had partnered with NIH to use SciENcv as an NSF-approved format for use in preparation of the biographical sketch section of an NSF grant proposal. The requirement to use SciENcv went into effect with the June 2020 Proposal & Award Policies Produces Guide for new proposals submitted or due on or after October 5, 2020.
Though NSF biographical sketch formats have been available in SciENcv as early as January 2015, the use of SciENcv was voluntary, so many NSF researchers and grant administrators are not familiar with My Bibliography or SciENcv.

Description: A successful collaboration that began in 2013 between the Sponsored Projects Administration (SPA) and the Health Sciences Library (HSL) featuring workshops on NIH Public Access Policy, My Bibliography and SciENcv prompted a similar collaboration to leverage that experience and knowledge to introduce NSF researchers and grant administrators to My Bibliography and SciENcv.
HSL developed and conducted in-person “SciENcv for NSF Biosketches” workshops from August 2019 through January 2020 in anticipation of the new biosketch format requirement. Due to COVID-19, subsequent presentations in spring 2020 moved to Zoom. The SPA education coordinator scheduled and booked the classroom spaces, posted the workshops on the SPA training page, announced them to grant staff via email listservs and participated in the presentation of the workshops. Participants are highly encouraged to contact the Health Sciences Library post-workshop for follow-up questions or issues with using SciENcv.

Conclusion: Collaboration with the Sponsored Projects Administration provides an excellent avenue to develop and promote workshops aimed at the campus grant community. To date five NSF SciENcv workshops have reached over 85 participants, including grant administrators and researchers from coordinate campuses. Workshop participants are encouraged to contact the Health Sciences Library to schedule additional group or individual training for junior or senior researchers and graduate students. Positive reception of the workshops resulted in invitations to present to a coordinate campus research institute and to the 250 plus members of the campus Grant Managers User Network at their 2020 fall meeting. Another NSF SciENcv biosketch training session is scheduled for May 2022 and it has hit an already raised registration cap.