Meeting Minutes - Boston University

Sponsored Programs and Post Award Financial Operations
Department Administrator Forum
CRC—PHO 206, Friday, October 17, 2014
MED—Hiebert Lounge, Tuesday, October 14, 2014
Meeting Minutes
Concur Travel System Presentation
Presented by:
Kara Sechrist, Travel Manager
PAFO Update
Slide Presentation can be found here under Fall 2014
PAFO Announcements
Lisa Ortega was hired to replace Shawn White. New RA Assignment listing can be
found here.
Miscellaneous Receivables will be transitioning to Post Award Financial Operations
on January 1, 2015 under the leadership of Melissa Downs, Director, Cash
Management. Additional information will be provided later this year.
Boston University has a new banking relationship with JP Morgan for the main
concentration account effective Tuesday, October 14th.
Property Management
As a reminder, please fill out this form when moving or disposing of equipment.
Biennial Equipment Inventory will start this winter so please assist Ben DeGennaro
and his team when needed.
A-133 Audit
The FY2014 A-133 Audit will be finalized December 2014.
Personnel Activity Reports
The 06/30/2014 PAR period was completed on Friday, October 3rd. 4,031 PARs
were sent out to Professional, Non-Professional, and Student Employees. Within the
last two weeks prior to due date, 58% of the PARs were returned to Effort. Please
do not wait until the last minute to return PARs.
Please be aware of the following PAR concerns when reviewing:
 Review PARs when you first get them
 Ensure the percentages tally to 100%
 Use whole numbers… system does not allow for decimals
 If the employee is not signing their own PAR, please indicate in title section,
who is signing… either the PI or Supervisor
 If you scan, Effort does not need original copy
 Effort does not need the back of the PAR returned
 Forms go to auditors so be careful of what you write on the form
Non Salary Cost Transfers
The Non Salary Cost Transfer process is being updated to follow the same revised
format of the Salary Cost Transfer. Effective December 6th, paper Non Salary Cost
Transfer forms will no longer be required as the questions will be imbedded into
SAP. More information to follow as we get closer to Go Live.
OSP Update
OSP Staffing Updates:
Sarah Yeboah was hired as the new OSP Manager on the Medical Campus.
She joined us two months ago.
Erin Ryan has taken a position as Senior Grant Administrator in the School of
Social Work effective January 19. We are working through a transition plan
that reduces her OSP effort over the coming months.
Danielle VanVooren was promoted to Research Administrator in OSP and
will take on Erin Ryan’s portfolio. Danielle was formerly in ROSA as a Lead
Award Analyst.
Shared updated OSP organizational chart OSP Org Chart and highlighted Jen
Marron’s move to the College of Engineering as their Assistant Dean of Grant
Administration and her oversight of the ENG Shared Services Pilot.
F & A Waiver Process
Please refer to the slides for details. The form will be available on the OSP Website
the first week in November.
Uniform Guidance
A communication will be delivered on October 31 from Andy Horner announcing
the Uniform Guidance website which will serve as a resource for updates and
information to the research administration community. The Uniform Guidance
replaces current OMB Circulars and will go into effect on December 26, 2014. We
will hold two forums for faculty and administrators (see below) to discuss key
information you need to know.
–
–
November 18th from 12-2pm Hiebert Lounge MED
November 20th from 12-2pm Photonics, Colloquia Room, 9th floor CRC
Revised PSF
Kaci Foster (Director of Research Operations, Systems and Analytics) reviewed an
updated Proposal Summary Form that will be released in the coming weeks. The
updated form reflects changes aimed at streamlining the information collected,
providing improved formatting for ease of use and collecting additional information
required. When the updated PSF is issued it will include a glossary to help answer
any questions and support consistency.
MyGrantExpenses
Kaci Foster, Director of ROSA provided a demonstration of the new tool that was
released to faculty in October. The goal of this tool was to give faculty direct access
to financial information with a streamlined and intuitive interface. If you would
like more information about this, please contact [email protected].

Download Report