In a briefing after the budget was announced, Science Insider reports on the specific “new grants management policies” that would support increasing the number of new awards.
In order to squeeze more grants out of the flat budget—the target is an 8% increase in new grants, to 672, for a total of 9415–NIH will put in place new grant management policies. Continuing grants will be cut 1% below the 2012 level, competing grants wouldn’t get inflationary increases in future years, and NIH will add a new layer of review for proposals from investigators who already have at least $1.5 million in funding.
Still, the success rate is projected to bump up only slightly from this year’s all-time low of 18% to 19%, NIH says. And although new grants will rise, the overall number of funded grants will actually drop by 56 to 35,888.
