NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION
OFFICE OF INSPECTOR GENERAL
OFFICE OF INVESTIGATIONS
CLOSEOUT MEMORANDUM
Case Number: A14010002 Page 1 of 1
NSF OIG received an allegation of plagiarism related to two significantly similar NSF
proposals submitted by different individuals from different campuses of the same institution. 1 Our
inquiry found that the Pls2 co-authored the text for their previously funded NSF proposal3 and
therefore did not commit research misconduct by reusing their own text. 4
Accordingly, this case is closed with no further action taken.
4
Regarding the parallel submission of significantly similar proposals, one of the Pis explained that the Pis "decided
the administration of the project would be more efficient if each campus and each PI were responsible only for the
student participants at their respective campuses" and thus they "collaborated to create two independent projects, as
described in the proposals .... " This approach overlooked or underestimated the potential for an outside party to
suspect plagiarism based on the textual similarities. We will recommend to the program officer that outreach to the
Pis regarding more appropriate ways to handle this type of submission might be useful.
NSF OIG Form 2 (11102)
Plagiarism (Verbatim)
Published by the National Science Foundation, Office of Inspector General on 2014-12-04.
Below is a raw (and likely hideous) rendition of the original report. (PDF)