Managing Your Grant

Photo Credit: UCLA Broad Stem Cell Research Center

Congratulations on Receiving a Grant from CIRM

The following information will help you comply with CIRM regulations and find information about our forms and policies.

If you have questions that aren’t addressed on this page contact your Grants Management Officer, or email the Grants Management Office at grantsmanagement@cirm.ca.gov.

CIRM Regulations

Grants Administration Policies

Other Regulations

Other Resources

Grants Management FAQ

Please see our Guide for Bridges Program Directors, Guide for SPARK Program Directors, Guide for Research Training Program Directors, and Guide for COMPASS Program Directors for information on administering a CIRM Bridges (EDUC2), CIRM SPARK (EDUC3), “CIRM Scholar” research training (EDUC4) award, or CIRM COMPASS (EDUC5) award. Also, see the “Modification of certain Prior Approval Requests & Trainee Appointments” memo of April 27, 2022, the Update to CIRM Trainee Appointment Forms 2022 and Update to CIRM Trainee Appointment Forms 2023, and the Clarifications for CIRM Training Award Financial Reports of May, 2023.
Please see our Guide for AOOs and Guide for FAOOs for information on fulfilling these important roles at your institution.

The type and number of reporting requirements for your award depend on the RFA program and are listed in your Notice of Grant Award. Minimally, Grantees must submit an Annual Programmatic Report and an Annual Financial Report. Annual Progress Reports are due the day after the end of each Budget Period, and Annual Financial Reports are due within 90 days of the end of each Budget Period. Clinical and Translational Awards will typically have quarterly progress and financial reporting along with Operational Milestone reports, which are due when the milestone has been achieved and may trigger the next disbursement. Please check CIRM’s Grants Management System for your reporting due dates, and contact your Grants Management Officer for help accessing the system or questions about due dates.  When the listed due date falls on a weekend or holiday, the report is due the next business day.

CIRM funds can be rebudgeted between budget categories as long as you adhere to any budget caps established by the GAP or individual RFA or Program Announcement. CIRM Training awards (EDUC2, EDUC3, EDUC4, and EDUC5), have special rebudgeting rules, see guidance above. Rebudgeting between overhead-included and overhead-excluded budget categories (i.e. from Supplies to Equipment) may create a change to Facilities and Indirect budget categories. A rebudgeting action cannot raise the overall grant total. Please contact a CIRM Grants Manager for help if needed.

For most awards, carry forward is allowable without prior approval. For Training awards (EDUC2, EDUC3, EDUC4, and EDUC5), obligated trainee funds, program administration and associated IDC carry forward automatically, see guidance above. For Operational Milestone based awards, carry-forward of funds between OM periods is allowable, but deficit spending is not. Any deficit incurred to reach an Operational Milestone beyond the CIRM funds disbursed and required co-funding will be the sole responsibility of the recipient to be covered by non-CIRM contingency funds

Grantees may request a one-time no-cost extension (NCE) up to 12 months on most CIRM awards unless otherwise indicated in the Program Announcement. A Prior Approval Request with a proper justification must first be submitted at least 30 days before the Project Period’s expiration. Prior Approval Requests are initiated by the PI in the Awards area of our Grants Management System. For Milestone-based awards (CLIN,TRAN) the final award end date is determined by achievement of the final Operational Milestone, which defines the period in which Awardee can conduct CIRM-funded activities and incur CIRM-funded expenditures.

CIRM establishes a cap on all annual base salaries (including bonuses, but exclusive of other fringe benefits) charged to CIRM awards in proportion to the % of salary or effort charged to the project as follows:

No additional CIRM funds will be provided to support salary cap increases. Biennial adjustments to the caps will be posted here.

CIRM also establishes annual stipend levels for CIRM Scholars on our Training Awards depending on their educational level. These ranges can also be used as a guide for Trainees on CIRM research awards. For Bridges (EDUC2), SPARK (EDUC3), and COMPASS (EDUC5) programs, please refer to the limits in the respective RFAs.

Trainees supported through the EDUC4 “CIRM Scholars” program:

Effective from 9/28/23

For Trainees whose most recent appointment began in Grant Year 1 or Grant Year 2 (second Year of Cohort 1, or First Year of Cohort 2)

For Trainees whose appointments/re-appointments begin in Grant Years 3, 4, or 5

Grantees may use the most recent stipend levels for any appointments made after the effective date, but no additional CIRM funds will be provided for existing awards.

“Tuition and fees” refer to charges imposed by the grantee for a student’s enrollment and educational services, which may also encompass the cost of health insurance. These expenses are eligible for reimbursement solely for individuals enrolled in accredited certificate, undergraduate, or graduate programs. Each trainee can request reimbursement for up to 100% of the initial $3,000 in tuition and fees, and 60% of subsequent expenses, capped at a maximum of $16,000. CIRM does not cover tuition and fees already subsidized by the Grantee. Postdoctoral or clinical trainee tuition and fees are ineligible for reimbursement.

When not otherwise specified by CIRM regulations, CIRM applies the Office of Management and Budget cost allocation principles including the determination of whether costs are 1) reasonable, 2) allocable, 3) consistently treated, and 4) adhering to any other limitations set forth by the PA/RFA or Notice of Grant Award. For more information, see the NIH Cost Principles. CIRM encourages grantees to use these cost principles to make their own determinations on cost allowability given CIRM cannot make a judgment on every cost scenario.

Allowable project expenses encompass, yet are not restricted to: personnel salaries, fringe benefits, specified supplies, tuition and fees, research animal expenditures, consulting fees, itemized clinical study outlays (encompassing research patient care costs), travel-related disbursements, project-related equipment, publication expenses, service agreements, subcontracts, and delineated administrative costs necessary for executing the endorsed project.

Please see FAQs for CIRM Awards for additional information about allowable costs.

A change in scope must be approved by CIRM prior to initiating such a change. Proper justification must be provided. Any change in scope must still be within the scope of the RFA program. Prior Approval Requests are initiated by the PI in the Awards area of our Grants Management System.

Non-Profit applicants may request Facilities costs for research awards consistent with their current, federally negotiated rates, when available. When research is conducted off-site, a grantee may request a portion of their Facilities cost based on their actual, out-of-pocket lease costs. Indirect costs are currently capped at 20% for most awards (exceptions include out Training and Conference Programs). These rates are applied to the Adjusted Project Costs which exclude Equipment, Tuition and Fees, Research Patient Care Costs, and the total cost of each service contract, Subcontract and Consultant agreement in excess of $25,000. For-profit applicants may request facilities costs up to 35% of Adjusted Project Costs and are not eligible for Indirect Costs. For organizations that do not have a federal rate agreement, internal documentation supporting both the allowable facilities cost rate and the methodology used to arrive at the amounts requested are required at time of contracting.

CIRM makes semi-annual, annual, or operational milestone payments on grant awards based on the Budget Period start date or operational milestones outlined in the Notice of Award. The first payment is made upon CIRM’s receipt of a fully signed NOA.

For awards without Operational Milestones, semi-annual or annual payments will continue to be processed as long as all required reports are submitted on time and accepted by CIRM. If a report is more than 60 days overdue, CIRM reserves the right to hold future payments on the grant award. Reporting requirements more than 90 days overdue may trigger an institutional hold on all payments to the grantee institution, The final payment on all grant awards is held until all required reports are received and accepted by CIRM.

For awards with Operational Milestones, the first payment is issued upon initiation of an award. Subsequent payments will be disbursed upon completion of specific Operational Milestones. Costs resulting from a delay or failure to meet an Operational Milestone will be the sole responsibility of the recipient. Successful applicants will have thoughtfully accounted for foreseeable project risks and developed contingency plans that do not involve additional funding from CIRM.

CIRM reserves the right to hold or terminate disbursements if CIRM determines, in its sole discretion, that a Suspension Event has occurred. A “Suspension Event” means a pre-defined condition that triggers a hold of CIRM funding until the suspension event has been resolved, if resolvable.

Reference: IP regulations for non-profits & for-profits and Publication requirements for non-profits and for-profits

Publications or Inventions resulting in whole or in part by CIRM funding should be disclosed to CIRM via the CIRM Publication or Invention Disclosure online module within 60 days of the publication date or invention disclosure to your organization. These publications and inventions also need to be reported in the subsequent Annual Programmatic Report. Please ask your Grants Management Specialist if you need further instructions accessing the online modules.

It is a goal of Propositions 71 and 14 that more than 50% of the goods and services used in your CIRM-supported research is purchased from California suppliers. CIRM grantees should make good faith efforts to obtain 50% or more of their goods and services from California suppliers. You will be asked to report this on your Annual Programmatic Report, so it is important to keep internal documentation on your expenditures. See the regulation for a definition of California supplier.

Most reporting templates are available in the Grants Management System under your awards information. You may also contact your Grants Management Officer if you have questions about CIRM’s forms.

Please refer to the Notice of Award for the relevant Grants Administration Policy. CIRM awards approved by the ICOC on or after 5/21/16 (CLIN, TRAN, DISC, EDUC, INFR, and converted awards) are governed by the CIRM Grants Administration Policy for Clinical Stage Projects or the CIRM Grants Administration Policy for Discovery, Translation, and Education Projects. Please note that the CIRM Grants Administration Policy for Clinical Stage Projects references PA 15-01, 15-02, and 15-03. These program announcements have been renamed to CLIN 1, CLIN 2, and CLIN 3 respectively.

After award closeout, CIRM grantees are still required to submit publication and invention disclosures that are a result of CIRM funding. Grantee Technology Transfer offices, or similar group, are responsible for submitting Annual Invention Utilization reports that include activity funded by closed CIRM awards. CIRM also has a record retention policy requiring applicable scientific and administrative records be held for a minimum of 5 years.

Per the Notice of Award, CIRM requires a Final Financial report 60 days after the award end date. This report provides CIRM with the total expenditures towards the CIRM funded project. Awards that report an unobligated balance at the end of an award have up to 120 days to return the funds to CIRM. CIRM will not consider revisions to any financial report 6 months from the award end date. After this time CIRM will accept revisions to the Final Financial report but will not issue payments for any additional expenditures reported after the 6-month timeframe.  The awardee remains obligated to return funds due as a result of later refunds, corrections, or other transactions, and CIRM may recover amounts based on the results of an audit covering any part of the period of grant support.

If you are an applicant at an institution with a CIRM Major Facility, you should always include Facilities B in the application budget and CIRM will determine if Facilities B are eligible to be funded if the application is approved.  Awardees cannot reallocate funds from the cut that CIRM will make based on the Facilities B rates calculated in the application budget. Facilities B cuts represent a savings to the State of California offsetting the initial investment made in the CIRM Major Facility. Facilities B cuts cannot be re-budgeted into Direct Project costs, either by a post-ICOC rebudgeting action or by excluding them from an application to a total cost capped award. In a direct cost capped award, the savings to California can be calculated without reducing the direct costs. When the award mechanism is total-cost capped, however, the Facilities B savings to the State must be realized within the total award cap, so always including Facilities B in your proposal budget avoids any unexpected reductions to the project’s direct cost should the proposal be funded. If your proposal has required co-funding and you suspect that it will not be eligible for Facilities B funding, please contact CIRM’s Grants Management Office.

For Operational Milestone (OM) based-awards, the initial achievement of an Operational Milestone must be reported via an Operational Milestone report (available from the reporting requirements section of your award record in our Grants Management System). If an OM is marked as complete in a quarterly or full progress report, and an OM report has not been already submitted and approved, an error will be displayed instructing you to complete the OM report first. In this case, please contact your Grants Manager if this will delay the filing of your quarterly or full progress report beyond the due date. An OM report should be filed as promptly as possible after achievement of the OM, delayed reporting may result in a delay in further disbursements.

Co-funding requirements are listed in the Program Announcement or Request for Applications and vary depending on program, clinical phase, and status as a California-based entity. CIRM will require co-funding from the applicant based on the total “Allowable Project Costs”. Allowable Project Costs are those costs permitted under CIRM policies and regulations and include direct, facilities and indirect costs. The sum of CIRM funds requested plus the co-funding contribution by the applicant make up the total Allowable Project Costs. The required co-funding and total project costs can be calculated with the formula “=CIRMFUNDING*(COFUNDING%/(1-COFUNDING%))”. For non-CA applicants, co-funding includes both the required co-funding on Allowable Project Costs and the unallowable non-CA costs portion.

CIRM’s Business Meeting Expenditure Policy is used for Mechanism 2 Conference Awards (EDUC 1.X). Please note that food unrelated to travel is an unallowable expense unless otherwise specified in the RFA.

For ME&I caps and other travel-related policies on CIRM awards, please see our Grantee Travel Quick Reference Guide.