Data Management Plan (DMP)

DMPs are not evaluation plans, but they should address how evaluation data will be handled and possibly shared.

DMPs are required for all NSF proposals, uploaded as a Supplementary Document in the FastLane.gov proposal submission system. They can be up to two pages long and should describe

• the kind of data you will gather
• how you’ll format the data and metadata (metadata is documentation about what your primary data are)
• what policies will govern the access and use of your data by others
• how you’ll protect privacy, confidentiality, security, and intellectual property
• who would be interested in accessing your data and in what ways they might use it
• your plans for archiving the data and preserving access to them

To learn more about data management plans, check out these resources:

• The ATE Central Handbook includes a sample data management plan and other helpful resources.
• The NSF’s Directorate for Education and Human Resources guidelines for data management plans.