Award

The award phase begins when the designated officer receives a notification from a funder about willingness to fund a project or activity. It is the shortest of the three phases, and it starts taking place when the funding organization sends a Notice of Award (NOA) to the successful applicant.

Here are the steps included in the award phase at Makerere:

Notification of Awardee

When reviews are done, the funder informs successful applicants on the award. Here then GAMSU starts mediating the legalities of the grant.

Negotiating and accepting Funding

At Makerere the Contract negotiation of the award is done by the Principal Investigator with support from GAMSU in accordance to the university and national policies and guidelines. 

The acceptance is done by the Vice Chancellor on behalf of the University Council.

A new project is communicated by the Head of GAMSU to the Vice-Chancellor for approval and legal document signing.

Before signing any bonding agreements with a funder, negotiation include a thorough review of the award terms and conditions by the University legal office. A copy award must be filed with Grants Administration and Management Support Unit.

A Grant Contract is only binding on the University after the University Council has pronounced herself by including it in the annual budget estimates.

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Setting up sub-award recipients

Where an awarded grant requires the participation of sub-recipients, the GAMSU will be responsible for preparing sub-award agreements and ensuring that they are signed by the designated official.

The PI is con be responsible for ensuring and completeness of the proposal as well as appropriateness of the proposed project team. Quality.

The Grants Office supports PIs in proposal development in various ways including developing a checklist for proposal development, editing proposal documents, compiling relevant support documents, providing the required templates, budget, and budget justification development.

We also guide on why grant project budgets should be made to include all appropriate costs, as direct project costs as well as institutional facilities and administrative costs (indirect costs). Any cost sharing commitments are only made with approval of the University Council.

In tally, the Grants Office coordinates with procurement, legal offices and other offices for a complete grants puzzle at MAK.

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