Office of Sponsored Programs

Facilitating Research and Scholarship

The Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP) supports and advances the College’s mission by providing leadership and expertise in grant administration and ensuring compliance with relevant regulations.

Contact us at research@merrimack.edu

About Us

OSP administers all federal, state, for-profit, nonprofit, and private foundations for faculty-led proposal submissions and awards involving research, education, community service, or other sponsor activities.

Services include:

Funding opportunities
  • Assists faculty and staff in searching for funding opportunities, i.e. request for proposals, request for letters of intent, white papers, etc., that can support their research or extramural projects.
  • Provides guidance on funding opportunity requirements.
Research compliance
  • Ensures that the College is complying with all applicable regulations and policies regarding financial conflict of interest (FCOI), responsible conduct of research (RCR), and research misconduct.
  • Ensures protocols and approvals for regulatory compliance are kept current throughout the life of the project.
Proposal Development and Submission (Pre-Award)
  • OSP provides “best practice” guidance and proposal development support to faculty and staff.
  • Provides proposal and budget development for submission.
  • Provides guidance and interpretation of the funding opportunity, solicitation, and sponsor requirements.
  • Ensures all submissions have institutional approval prior to submission.
  • Submits proposals, Letters of Intent, pre-proposals, and white papers on behalf of the College.
Grant Administration (Post-Award)
  • Provides a comprehensive review of grant award, contracts, cooperative agreements, and Material Transfer Agreement terms and conditions.
  • Works with the Office of General Counsel to negotiate and acceptance of contractual terms and conditions, including subaward agreements.
  • OSP serves as the point of contact to the sponsor for all grant administration activities, i.e. budget modifications, change of PI, No-Cost Extensions, prior approvals, etc.
  • Ensures that all reporting requirements are completed in a timely manner.
  • Initiates all close-out activities in accordance with the grant requirements.
Training and Education
  • Provides current information regarding any changes to policies, practices, and regulations.
  • Provides training opportunities to the research community regarding proposal and budget development, research compliance, and sponsor policies and regulations.
Customer Service
  • Provides faculty and staff with the expertise and support needed during the entire grant lifecycle, beginning with funding opportunities through grant closeout.
  • OSP collaborates with faculty, staff, departments, the provost’s office, development, fiscal affairs, offices of the executive vice president, and the general counsel.
REDCap at Merrimack
  • Merrimack is now part of over 7,000 institutions who comprise the REDCap Consortium.

  • REDCap is a secure web application for building and managing online surveys and databases. The software is specifically designed to support data capture for research studies and operations.

  • Faculty interested in utilizing REDCap or learning more about the software should reach out to redcap@merrimack.edu.

Research at Merrimack Magazine

Read Insights and Innovations: Summer/Fall 2021

Additional Resources

Take Merrimack's Office of Sponsored Programs Research Survey

The Merrimack College Office of Research & Sponsored Programs asks that you please complete the following survey as it pertains to your research endeavors and our ability to provide faculty with effective resources to conduct their research.

Research.gov & Grants.gov Deadlines

  • Friday, October 20, 2023 (5 p.m., submitter’s local time) is the deadline for Research.gov and Grants.gov submissions. 
    • More information can be found below under “Additional Resources”.