Permanent Staff (SHRA)

No

Business Officer - Contributing

Research Administrator

20035388

P012620

$50,000-$58,000

To learn more about the pay band for this branch and role, please see the Career Banding rates spreadsheet.

GN12

Full-Time Permanent

40

M-F 8:00am-5:00pm.
Occasional overtime may be necessary to meet proposal or close-out deadlines.

School of Education-340100

04/15/2021

05/03/2021

Chapel Hill, NC

Accounting/Finance/Auditing

The School of Education is an academic unit reporting to the Provost. The School is a major center of research, teaching, and public service within the State of North Carolina, the nation, and the world. The School offers a full range of undergraduate and graduate programs. The mission of the School of Education is to conduct research, and generate basic and applied knowledge about human development, educational technology and entrepreneurship, teaching and learning, school counseling, school psychology, administration, as well as educational policy and leadership; prepare leaders in the profession of education by conducting outstanding research, teaching, and service; and assist in the development of strong and effective public schools in North Carolina. In order to fulfill its mission, the School is organized into three academic divisions: (1) Culture, Curriculum, & Teacher Education (CCATE), (2) Learning, Development & Psychological Sciences (LDPS), and (3) Educational Policy, Organization, & Leadership (EPOL).

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is an equal opportunity and affirmative action employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, color, disability, gender, gender expression, gender identity, genetic information, race, national origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, or status as a protected veteran.

This position is primarily responsible for managing a portfolio of funding, with the majority comprised of contract and grants, which include internally and externally funded awards for the School of Education. The Research Administrator will be responsible for monitoring and performing the tasks required for each project beginning at the time of award notice until the award has been financially closed. Additionally, this position will be responsible for managing the non-research based contractual obligations, agreements, subscriptions, licenses, and MOU’s for the School, internal faculty funding awards, as well as endowment income trust funds. This position will have school level oversight of the budgetary and financial activities for these sources of funds. The person in this position will work closely with multiple personnel within the School and across campus to ensure effective management of sponsored research and other previously described sources of funds. This position will also assist as a backup for contract and grant proposal development and submission during peak volume submission times. Particularly, the person in this position will work closely with the PI’s and act as a liaison between the Office of Sponsored Research and the School of Education.

Job Duties include, but are not limited to:
• Reviewing all terms and conditions for all sponsored awards and grants.
• Ensuring budgets are appropriately loaded and working with OSR on any corrections.
• Conducting new award meetings with PI’s to ensure all parties are aware of timelines, spending plans, and appropriate uses of the funding.
• Preparing any requests for budgets, re-budgeting, subcontract, extensions and any other project modifications.
• Oversight of any official correspondence between PI and sponsor as needed.
• Ensuring compliance per sponsor guidelines and policies, as well as campus and School of Education policies.
• Alerting PI’s when post award reports are due.
• Coordinating with other School administrative units on policies that are affected or driven by external funding activities.
• Tracking all cost sharing and time commitments to funded projects.
• Preparing regular statements for PI examination and approvals.
• Preparing the final reconciliation and closeouts for each award.
• Reviewing all HR actions to verify funding sources for employees being paid from contracts, grants and/or endowment income funds.
• Processing PAATs and funding swap actions ensuring salary actions are processed appropriately and in a timely manner (i.e. salary release and cost share).
• Working with faculty on summer salary planning for the portfolio of funding managed by this position and process summer salary payments through the HR system.
• Serving as the ECRT Administrator and ensuring all effort reports are accurate are certified for the School.
• Process tuition and fee payments in GradStar as needed.
• Reviewing and processing all expenditure requests by payment vouchers, p-card, etc.
• Serving as the p-card reconciler for p-card holders who charge to contracts and grant projects.
• Reconciling payroll and operating charges on each project.
• Managing endowment trust funds and other non-OSR funding by working directly with faculty and school administration on budgeting, spending plans, and regular reporting. Ensuring that funds are spent per the purpose they were created (e.g., donor restrictions, source requests, etc.).
• Managing the non-research based contractual obligations, agreements, subscriptions, licenses, and MOU’s for the School.
• Creating and maintain a database of contractual obligations, key dates, and other demographics for analysis and reporting.
• Performing data retrieval and/or mining of award data through utilization of existing campus and College database platforms.
• Providing data analysis of award data and translate findings into requested written reports, inclusive of charts, graphs and tables to meet the needs of School.
• Providing input and substantive contributions to strategic planning processes aimed at improving and making current School tracking and reporting systems increasingly more user friendly.
• Responding to ad hoc data requests from School leadership and stakeholders.
• Developing and maintaining a process manual that chronicles data retrieval processes specific to the School.
• Maintaining research databases to ensure reliability and integrity of data.
• Researching and providing outreach and education to faculty and researchers in the area of new or revised sponsor guidelines and regulations in juxtaposition with School and campus directives and policies.
• Providing training (both School-wide and one-on-one) on grants processes and changes to grant processes.
• Developing and providing training opportunities to faculty that enhance their abilities to manage awards through close-out.
• Developing content for the School’s intranet resources website and keep updated with current information.
• Will serve as back up to the Research Coordinator to assist at peak volume submission times to help develop and submit contracts and grant proposals.
• The person in this position will also be requested at times to assist with other special projects or reports as needed by the Business Operations Office and/or School of Education.
• Other duties as assigned.
• Occasional overtime may be necessary to meet close-out or proposal deadlines.

Bachelor’s degree in business administration, public administration, or related business area; or equivalent combination of training and experience. All degrees must be received from appropriately accredited institutions.

• Prior post-award sponsored research experience within higher education with and an in-depth understanding of federal, state, and private funding agencies.
• Ability to learn and develop in-depth understanding of University policies.
• Ability to analyze and translate the results of data queries into formats appropriate for reporting purposes.
• Strong and articulate communicator with proven presentation skills.
• Strong organizational skills and demonstrated ability to prioritize tasks.
• Ability to work independently in a fast-paced and deadline driven environment.
• Demonstrated proficiency in using Microsoft Word, Excel and Adobe software applications.

• Minimum of three years in post-award sponsored research experience within higher education.
• Experience in higher education proposal development and submission specifically with Federal funding agencies.
• Ability to quickly research, synthesize and communicate complicated information and concepts associated with contract and grant management, changing federal, state and University regulations and policies.
• Ability to troubleshoot problems and offer solutions to School administration.
• Demonstrated experience in successfully cultivating positive working relationships with faculty, department administration, University offices, and external sponsor officials.
• Proficient ability to utilize University financial and research computing systems.
• Willingness and interest to assume increasing responsibilities.
• Certified Research Administrator (CRA) or Certified Financial Research Administrator (CFRA).
• Advanced skills using Microsoft Excel.

Overtime occasionally

No