Research Administration System (RAS)

Rollout Date: April 2006
 

About

RAS is an integrated part of the UCSF PeopleSoft financial system to help manage Research Administration activities, as well as an integration of pre-award and post-award processing by Departments, Office of Sponsored Research (OSR), and Extramural Funds Accounting (EMF)

RAS has enabled improved service and enhanced individual staff effectiveness by offering:

  • Access to data needed to deliver quality services
  • Expedited processing
  • Minimized duplicate data entry
  • Reduced redundant manual activities
  • Enhanced reporting capabilities
  • Improved controls and compliance


Proposal Express was the first component of RAS to be rolled out to the campus. Proposal Express is a custom pre-award module that Departments use to generate the UCSF OSR Approval Form for each proposal that they submit to either the Contracts & Grants or the Industry Contracts Divisions of OSR. OSR staff then record the receipt and review assignment and ultimate disposition of the proposal in the new system, allowing departments to track the status of the proposal and know when/how it was shipped to the sponsoring agency.

Launched on February 15, 2005, Proposal Express was a significant step toward integration, and began preparing the campus for the transition to PeopleSoft Grants. Proposal Express represents the first time that Departments and OSR are working together in an on-line system to record and track proposals.

Specific information related to implementation timeline, training, and other issues can be found in our Campus Communications. Basic information about the design and function of Proposal Express can be found in the presentation that was delivered to the campus at town hall meetings in December of 2004.