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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
on Collaborators and Other Affiliations (COA) Information Template
January 30, 2023
The National Science Foundation (NSF) requires that Collaborators and Other Affiliations
information must be separately provided for each individual identified as senior project personnel
(see NSF Proposal and Award Policies and Procedures Guide (PAPPG), Chapter II.D.2.h(iii)).
The COA information must be provided through use of the COA template. The template has been
developed to be fillable, however, the content and format requirements must not be altered by the
user. This template must be saved in .xlsx format and directly uploaded in Research.gov under
Senior Personnel Documents as a single-copy document.
The following are frequently asked questions that may be useful in preparation of the COA
template.
General
1. Must the information requested for each section be in alphabetical order?
The information provided in the tables is not required to be sorted, alphabetically or otherwise.
2. In previous versions of the COA, instructions required that each PI, co-PI, and
senior personnel provide a list of their postdoctoral scholar sponsor(s) and the
postgraduate-scholar(s) they sponsored. Does this information need to be included in the
current COA?
Submission of information on an individual’s own postdoctoral scholar sponsor(s) and/or advisees
is no longer required.
3. Why does information on postdoctoral sponsor(s) and scholar(s) advised no longer
need to be included on the COA template?
Submission of information on an individual’s postdoctoral sponsor(s) and the postdoctoral
scholar(s) the individual has advised is no longer required. This is purposeful and we no longer
require this information to be reported. These persons may be listed in Table 4 of the COA
template if they were/are co-authors or collaborators of the individual submitting the template.
Where appropriate, the persons also may be included in Table 2 in situations where a personal,
family or business relationship would otherwise preclude their service as a reviewer.
4. Would a “foreign” senior key person need to complete the COA template?
Regardless of whether an individual is located outside the US, all individuals identified as senior
personnel need to complete the template.
5. If there is someone that belongs in more than one category (e.g., PhD advisee and
co-author), should that person be listed in both categories?
If someone belongs in more than one category, list their name in all eligible categories.