Rationale and Review Committee Structure
Research under the Hatch, McIntire-Stennis, and Animal Health and Disease Acts is conducted in three Colleges that constitute the Virginia Agricultural Experiment Station (VAES):
For each VAES project proposal submitted, the Assistant or Associate VAES Director in the Project Leader's College will chair the review (hereafter referred to as the Chair). The Chair is responsible for selecting the Project Review Committee consisting of three or more members who are proficient in the subject of the proposed project. These may be chosen from outside the University if recommended by the Department/Unit Head or deemed appropriate by the Chair.
Faculty from other units within the University may be eligible for VAES support. Such research would have to be reviewed by this policy, fit within the mission of VAES, and approved by the Director. The VAES Director or College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Assistant Director or Associate Director will chair the Project Review Committee.
Faculty from other units within the University may be eligible for VAES support. Such research would have to be reviewed by this policy, fit within the mission of VAES, and approved by the Director. The CALS VAES Assistant/Associate Director will chair the Project Review Committee.
The Project Leader will prepare the proposal as specified in Essentials of a Project Proposal in the Administrative Manual for the Hatch (Experiment Station) Act as Amended, the Administrative Manual for the McIntire-Stennis Cooperative Forestry Program, and the Administrative Manual for the Continuing Animal Health and Disease Research Program (1992), Appendix F. Early in the new-project development process, the Project Leader is strongly encouraged to initiate a subject search using the USDA/CSREES Current Research Information System (CRIS) - http://cris.csrees.usda.gov/Welcome.html.
The proposed research project should be reviewed by a statistician to assure that the experimental design and statistical analyses are adequate. The Project Leader may meet with a member of the Statistics Consulting Center or the Department/Unit Head may designate someone with statistical expertise to serve as a departmental reviewer. The Project Leader will then submit the proposal to his/her Department/Unit Head for peer review in accordance with departmental procedures. If the research involves animals, human subjects, or recombinant DNA, the Project Leader is responsible for submitting the required protocol forms to the appropriate University review committee(s). Proposals will not be forwarded to USDA/CSREES without required approvals.
Proposal Submission and Review Procedures
The Department/Unit Head will transmit the departmentally approved project proposal to the Chair of the Project Review Committee for that College. It is preferable that the following items be transmitted to the Chair electronically. Items to be transmitted include:
The Chair will select reviewers and distribute copies of the proposal to the Project Review Committee, who will return the Project Review Forms and comments to the Chair by a specified date (after at least three weeks).
Each proposal will be evaluated according to the following criteria:
Each reviewer recommends that the proposal be:
The Chair will convene the Committee, the Project Leader, and the Department Head to review the proposal. The Chair will forward reviewers' comments to the Project Leader and Department Head prior to the oral review. The oral review may be omitted for revised/replacement projects, at the discretion of the Chair, if a majority of the review forms are checked by the reviewers as "approved with no changes" or "approved with minor changes." If an oral review is not conducted, the Chair will provide a written summary of the Review Committee comments to the Project Leader with a copy to the Department/Unit Head and the Review Committee. An oral review is required for a Project Leader’s initial VAES Project.
NOTE: Faculty located at off-campus Agricultural Research and Extension Centers (ARECs) will submit proposals to the Center Director who will contact the appropriate Department Head on campus regarding departmental policy for securing a peer review before the proposal is sent to VAES for review. The Center Director will forward the proposal and departmental review, if applicable, to the VAES Director, who will serve as Chair. The Chair will forward the proposal to the review committee and to the subject-matter Department Head, who will be invited to attend the oral review.
The Project Leader will comply with the recommendations of the Project Review Committee and submit the revised proposal to the Department/Unit Head, accompanied by a letter delineating the changes that were made in response to the recommendations of the reviewers and/or a rebuttal for any recommendations which the Project Leader does not accept. The Project Leader will enter CRIS Forms AD-416 and AD-417 on the CRIS website - http://cwf.uvm.edu/cris/ and send a copy of the proposal electronically to the VAES office. The Department/Unit Head will transmit to the Chair:
The Chair will sign Form AD-416 and transmit the above items to the VAES Director accompanied by a letter listing names of the reviewers and date of the oral review (if applicable). For Mclntire-Stennis proposals, the Administrative-Technical Representative (A-TR) must sign Form AD-416, certifying that the proposal complies with the purposes of the McIntire-Stennis Act.
The VAES Director will meet with the Chair, the Department Head, and the Project Leader if there are any questions or concerns. When the Project Leader, the Department/Unit Head, the Chair of the Project Review Committee, and the Director agree that the proposed project should be accepted, the Director will approve it, assign a project number, enter Form CSREES-2008, and transmit the proposal, CRIS Forms AD-416, AD-417, and CSREES-2008 electronically to CRIS/CSREES/USDA. The CSREES Project Reviewer may possibly contact the Director, Assistant/Associate Director, or Project Leader if he/she has questions or requires additional information. If a proposed project is deferred, the CSREES Project Reviewer will notify the Director, who will confer with the Project Leader, Department/Unit Head, and Chair of the Project Review Committee to resolve the concerns.
After approval by CSREES, the Director will send copies of Forms CSREES-166 (Project Review and Comment Sheet), AD-416, AD-417, and CSREES-2008 to the Chair of the Project Review Committee, the Department/Unit Head, and the Project Leader. These documents, the proposal, and all pertinent correspondence will be retained in the official project file in the VAES Director's office. Project files will be retained for three years after termination of the project.
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