Program officers have been noticing an increase in deficiencies over the past few months, which not only extend processing time but work against the PIs' best interests. Failure to list past advisors, advisees and recent collaborators risks reducing the potential numbers of usable reviewers, because such people may be asked to review the proposal and only at panel time be disqualified when their conflict is discovered, resulting in fewer reviews for the panel to consider. Some PIs are including their full publication list rather than the 10 mandated by NSF (5 related to the proposal and 5 other significant publications). This is unfair to the many PIs who comply, and such proposals will be returned. See GPG pages 8 and 9 for a clear description of the guidelines.

Use of small fonts and complex, very small figures irritates reviewers and panelists (not a good idea). See GPG page 5. Some PIs do not identify the program announcement when responding to a solicitation (mandatory), or do not avail themselves of the opportunity to identify the Division and Program if responding to the twice-yearly target dates. Such PIs become surprised when they learn that such a proposal may have been assigned to an unintended Program.

Please make sure that ALL proposals to the Division are accompanied by the UNOLS Ship Request Form. This is the only way we can be sure that a UNOLS ship is, or is not, required. The form can be found on the UNOLS web site at http://www.gso.uri.edu/unols/unols.html#shiptimereq .

A small number of proposals involve work with vertebrate animals. The "check box" on the cover sheet should be marked and the appropriate institutional documentation must be attached.

A declined proposal may be resubmitted, but only after it has undergone substantial revision. Resubmittals that have not clearly taken into account the major comments or concerns resulting from the prior NSF review may be returned without further review (GPG p.18).

`Group' (collaborative) proposals - those submitted by three or more PIs and possibly involving more than one institution - may exceed 15 pages but are subject to tightly controlled page limitations which are rigorously enforced. The conditions are described on page 14 of the GPG, and it is strongly recommended that the PI contact the cognizant program officer before submission.

Finally, electronic submission of all proposals will become mandatory by October of 2000. It is not too soon to think about using Fastlane electronic submission now, and we invite you to try it. Once you start using the system, subsequent submissions will become easier because, aside from no longer generating and mailing hard copies, you will no longer have to generate all proposal components from scratch, but merely update the cover page, vita, etc. Information to get you started can be found on the NSF web site at: http://www.fastlane.nsf.gov/. and from your institutional office of sponsored programs.