Finalized Grants Data Standards and Guidance

Background

Pursuant to the Grant Reporting Efficiency and Agreements Transparency Act of 2019 (GREAT Act) and OMB Memorandum M-24-11, this page is the current home for all finalized grants1 data standards and associated guidance on applying those standards. The content of the page will grow over time, as additional standard data elements are finalized and associated implementation guidance is issued. When fully implemented, these grants data standards will reduce grant recipient burden and compliance costs, enable and drive high quality analysis of grants data, improve grant and program management outcomes, enable a robust ecosystem of technology solutions to manage the collection and flow of grants data, improve interoperability and information exchange between government systems, and increase transparency to the public.

OMB Memorandum M-24-11 states:

  • A subset of data elements that pertain to grants and cooperative agreements developed in response to the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act (FFATA) of 2006 (as amended by the DATA Act of 2014) contained in the data dictionary of USAspending.gov will serve as the initial Core Data Elements for the data standards required by the Grant Reporting Efficiency and Agreements Transparency (GREAT) Act of 2019.

  • Federal agencies will continue FFATA reporting requirements without disruption, as the Core Data Element designation builds on and does not disrupt existing data flows.

  • For future proposed data elements to the USAspending.gov data dictionary, the Department of the Treasury will, prior to making relevant changes to the website, consult with OMB and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) (as the Standards Setting Agency) to determine if the proposed data element is applicable to grants and cooperative agreements; if so, OMB and HHS will also need to consult on its definition and will make a determination as to whether it will be included in the Core Data Elements.

  • Data elements will be finalized in a series of tranches over time. OMB will announce the publication of each tranche as it is completed.

Finalized Grants Standard Data Elements (SDEs)

  • This spreadsheet contains all finalized grants standard data elements (SDEs) to date pursuant to the Grant Reporting Efficiency and Agreements Transparency Act of 2019 (GREAT Act) and OMB Memorandum M-24-11.

  • The first iteration of Finalized Grants SDEs is composed of the ‘initial core data elements’ defined in the GREAT Act and designated by M-24-11 as the subset of USAspending.gov data elements related to grants and cooperative agreements captured in its data dictionary.

  • Additional SDEs and metadata will be finalized and added to the spreadsheet in the future.

  • Download all finalized standard data elements to date here: [Finalized Grants Standard Data Elements v1.0 (2024-6-6)]

Strategic Approach

  • An outline of our strategic plan for executing these requirements is available [here].

Links

  1. GRANT REPORTING EFFICIENCY AND AGREEMENTS TRANSPARENCY ACT OF 2019 (GREAT Act)

  2. M-24-11

  3. USAspending.gov

  4. Grants.gov

    Description: Grants.gov is a centralized platform where grant seekers can find and apply for federal funding opportunities.

  5. SAM.gov

    Description: SAM.gov is the Official U.S. Government System for Contract Opportunities, Contract Data Reports, Wage Determinations, Federal Hierarchy for awarding/funding agencies, Assistance Listings, Entity Information for all entities registered to do business with the government, and Entity Reporting.

  6. FAC.gov

    Description: The Federal Audit Clearinghouse is used to both submit and review single audits of federal grantees that receive more than a certain amount of grant dollars in a given year.

  7. FIBF GRM v2.0

    Description: The FIBF is a model that enables the Federal government to better coordinate and document common business needs across agencies and focus on outcomes, data, processes and performance. FIBF GRM focuses on grants.

Questions or Comments?

Have questions or comments on this page? If you have questions about the content of this page, including any questions about governmentwide grants data standards pursuant to the GREAT Act of 2019, please direct them to GrantsDataStandards@hhs.gov. Please refrain from directing such questions to normal Grants.gov support resource channels and use this email instead.

Change History

Date Change
June 6, 2024 Initial page content and ‘finalized grants standard data elements’ document posted, covering the ‘initial core data elements’ pursuant to the GREAT Act and designated in M-24-11.

1 Throughout this page, references to ‘grants’ or ‘grantees’ should be understood to also encompass cooperative agreements and their recipients, respectively.