The new Data Management and Sharing Plans (DMSP) templates for the National Science Foundation (NSF) and National Institutes of Health (NIH) will go into effect in April and May. Help is available from the University Libraries. The University Libraries have updated their research guides to reflect these changes. The two resources below can assist you with data management plans and public access policy requirements.
- Research Data Management Basics: Data Management Plans - provides information about funder data management plans and tools to help with writing plans and understanding requirements and terminology.
- Public Access Policies has information to help with understanding publisher and funder policies, AAMs, persistent IDs (PIDs), research repositories, and more.
Reach out to datahelp@gmu.edu with questions about DMSPs, publication and data sharing requirements, publisher policies, research repositories, and related information.
NSF
Effective April 27, 2026, Proposals must use the Data management tool to conform to the new federal guidelines.
A valid DSMP must include a detailed plan or a statement that no detailed plan is needed, with a clear justification of why no plan is needed. The document should describe how the proposal will conform to NSF policy on dissemination and sharing of results. Recipients must share all data supporting NSF funded publications at the time of publication. Exceptions must be justified in the DMSP.
Here is a quick breakdown of the changes for the new DMSP form that will need to be completed on research.gov.
According to NSF:
- The new form will be a structured survey.
- Data sharing is expected for funded research.
- Reasons for not sharing data must be described.
- Detailed information about the NSF changes and what to expect can be found in their policy change announcement.
- Individual NSF directorates may provide guidance or impose their own criteria beyond the general NSF requirements. As usual, pay attention to any additional information from the directorate and follow those guidelines.
NIH DMSP changes:
Effective May 25, 2026, NIH will be implementing a new DMSP template to reduce the administrative burden. See NOT-OD-26-046 for more details.
The new template applies to DMSPs and the Genomic Data Sharing policy.
- The DMSP template will be structured, with yes/no questions or short responses
- Preview the pending new template is available: Data Management and Sharing Plan Format Page
- For proposals submitted before May 25, continue to use the current templates.
The above information has also been posted to the OSP Proposal Process webpage.