SFSIAQ12R00012_ Q A.pdf

SFSIAQ12R0012

SLS Distance Learning Mentors Solicitation Q&A

1. Can the offsite location designated by the contractor include the mentor’s personal residence, provided all other requirements listed in the SOW are met?

Yes, as long as the contractor and mentor meet all the other requirements and have the required equipment.

2. Can the “landline” for the phone requirement include VoIP type services such as Vonage or Skype, provided it meets the other requirements?

Yes, provided the student can use a landline phone or cell phone to call in and is not required to have VOIP on their end to call in.

3. Where the RFP requires that “Contractors must provide Management and Quality

Assurance Surveillance Plans.”, does the government intend for the Contractor to supply a “Program Management Plan” and “Quality Assurance Plan”? Typically, the Quality

Assurance Surveillance Plan (QASP) is provided by the government after award, and the adjustments are made to the Contractors Quality Assurance Plan to align with the government’s QASP.

Yes, the acquisitions office requests that QAP and management plans are included in your proposal.

4. Can a vendor submit a bid as a prime and be a sub on another bid?

Yes.

5. Will the government provide a set of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) related to the

Quality Assurance requirement described in Section C.11?

No. This requirement is not a performance based requirement. The contractor must follow the Government direction, as long as it is within the scope of the contract.

6. Will the government provide bidders with the prioritized list of language identified in

Section C.17s based on current DOS requirements? Could you please provide a list of your top 20 priority languages?

Our priority languages for distance learning are listed below, though other languages, as listed in Section C.17, may be required in the future.

- Arabic

- Dari

- Japanese

- Farsi

- French

- German

- Greek

- Haitian

- Korean

- Mandarin Chinese

- Pashto

- Portuguese

- Polish

- Russian

- Spanish

- Urdu

7. Will FSI give preference to instructors who have experience teaching at FSI as a language instructor or curriculum developer?

No preferential treatment will be given.

8. Can instructors currently contracted with FSI as language instructors be proposed or submitted for TOs once the contract is awarded as Distance Learning Mentors?

9. Can instructors currently contracted with FSI as substitute language instructors be proposed or submitted for TOs once the contract is awarded as Distance Learning

Mentors?

10. Can candidates who have been submitted, but not selected as an on-site language training instructors for positions be submitted?

Yes, provided he/she meets all the requirements laid forth in the SOW.

11. Does the government desire bidders to provide a rate for each language, or a blended rate encompassing all languages?

A fully loaded labor hour rate is requested without language differentiation.

12. Can the ceiling value of the contract exceed $2M in a given year (e.g., while an individual Task Orders cannot exceed the stated ceiling, can multiple TOs be awarded whose combined value exceeds $2M)?

13. Section C.7 states "Four out of five of the days are generally expected to be worked at an offsite location designated by the Contractor." Does this mean that Distance Learning

Mentors will be able to work from home or will they need to work on-site at the

Contractor's facility?

They may work from any location that meets the requirements laid forth in Section C.1.9.

14. Section C.7 states that there are "Part-time schedules: Seven or fewer hours per day" available. What is the estimated breakdown between full-time and part-time Distance

Learning Mentors?

Full-time mentors will have 25 or more students.

15. Based on section B.1. (b) this contract is set-aside for HUBZone, SDVOSB and WOSB.

However, in the clauses incorporated by reference appears FAR 52.219-27 Notice of

Total Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business set-aside and FAR 52.219-3

Notice of Total HUBZone set-aside indicating that only offerors that are HUBZone and

SDVOSB are eligible. Please confirm that fulfilling one of these criteria from B.1 (b) is sufficient.

Only HUBZone, SDVOSB or WOSB companies will be awarded an IDIQ.

16. Is FSI currently using a web-based conferencing platform? If yes, please identify the name of the platform.

We have licenses for Adobe Connect, though we are not at the moment using them for

Distance Learning.

17. Which video and voice chat software does FSI currently use for distance learning? Does

FSI have a preferred video and voice chat software other than what is currently used?

We have licenses for Adobe Connect, though we are not at the moment using them for

Distance Learning.

18. Please identify the name of the Learning Management System (LMS) currently used by

FSI to support the Distance Learning (DL) program.

We use Learn.com’s LearnCenter software for our LMS and SharePoint for supplementary material.

19. Please confirm that the contractor is not required to integrate their proposed technology platform with the current FSI LMS.

The Contractor is not required to integrate their proposed technology platform with the current FSI LMS.

20. Please confirm that FSI will provide the contractor with templates for the Student

Assessment as well as the Student Tracking Sheets. Can you please provide an example of these documents?

FSI will provide the contractor with templates for the Student Assessment as well as the

Student Tracking Sheets. Because the actual working templates are part of a database residing on our protected SharePoint site, we cannot provide exact copies, but the attached are the versions we used prior to migrating to SharePoint and show what we track.

21. Please confirm that FSI will be responsible for providing any/all technical support for DL students and instructors when they are onsite and offsite.

FSI provides technical support to both Mentors and students, though Mentors will be expected to master the technical tasks that are part of their duties.

22. Is the technical support provided through the online platform? What is the Contractor’s responsibility for providing technical support for the online platform and otherwise, please specify.

Contractor does not need to provide technical support for the online platform.

23. Will DL Mentors be responsible for developing curriculum (refer to Section C.5 – Data

Rights)?

DL Mentors will be responsible for developing language materials as specified in Section

C.5.

24. Will the contract be permitted to bill the government for time spent by DL Mentors completing in-person, pre-semester orientations and mentor meetings hosted at FSI

(referenced in C.5, first bullet)?

They may bill for time on site in pre-semester orientation and during-semester mentor meetings, but they may not bill for travel time.

25. Is the Contractor required to provide periodic training to maintain the skills of the instructor? Would these hours be billable?

There is no requirement for Contractor to provide training as long as the Mentor meets the requirements laid out. Any training conducted by the Contractor is not billable to FSI.

26. Will billing for DL Mentor time be permitted if it goes beyond the estimated level of effort detailed in Section C.7 (e.g., additional morning preparation or end of day administration, etc.)?

Only when authorization by the COR/GTM.

27. Is this program a new FSI initiative (DL Mentors)? If not, please identify the current incumbent(s).

Currently it is run in-house by FSI.

28. Please identify the Instructor resources to be provided to the contractor by FSI (e.g., SCOLA, CL-150, etc.

Mentors will be given access to all necessary systems for mentoring distance learning.

29. Will the DL Mentors be teaching initial acquisition or sustainment and enhancement language training?

For current distance learning courses, the role of the Mentor in a Distance Language course is to guide the student’s study of the materials in the foreign language and continually monitor their progress. They do not teach initial acquisition, though may provide the student supplementary materials geared towards initial acquisition that the student may study on their own time. (this may change for new courses we build going forward).

30. Section C.10 states “Contractors must make every effort to ensure the security of all equipment, peripherals, and materials”, please provide a definition of FSI’s security requirements (type and level of security required) for this program.

There is no security requirement for this work. However, FSI wants to ensure that government property is not mishandled, damaged, stolen or missing due to the contractor’s behavior.

31. How will the task orders (TOs) be competed?

Task Orders will be awarded on a rotation basis among the IDIQs.

32. Will TO award be based on the most technically acceptable (“best” DL Mentor proposed) or price?

The IDIQ contracts will be awarded based on the most technically acceptable proposal.

Proposals will be evaluated by using the trade off procurement method, when technical and past performance are significantly more important than price. After the IDIQ contracts are awarded, the Task Oders will be awarded on a rotation basis among the

IDIQs.

33. Is it FSI or the Contractor’s responsibility to assess the level of the student being mentored? If it is the Contractor’s responsibility will mentors be given guidelines on assessment?

The Mentor is required to assess the students. FSI provides each Mentor with assessment sheets tailored to their course.

34. Since daily email is part of the DL Mentor’s daily responsibilities, will FSI provide an email platform for Mentors?

Section C.10 specifies that Mentors must have “an email account to which students can email the contractor.”

35. We are based in Atlanta so we would offer training from our center. From the terms of your solicitation, mentors will have to attend training at FSI and “work at FSI a minimum of 1 day a week”. Does this preclude us from offering our services- unless we send our mentors to Washington or could all the training that the mentors receive from FSI could be done also via teleconferencing?

Mentors must attend on-site meetings in person.

36. C.5. Requirements and elsewhere. Learn Center and Distance Language SharePoint sites are mentioned throughout the solicitation. Please explain what these are. Will all

Mentors work with students through these sites?

LearnCenter is our LMS that provides our course materials, forums and chat functionality. SharePoint houses our course supplementary materials and our tracking and assessment tools. Mentors will work with students through a combination of

LearnCenter, SharePoint, email and phone.

37. C.5. Detailed notes. Are Mentors to provide their own forms for keeping student information, notes, etc., or does FSI provide these forms and formats?

FSI will provide templates and forms.

38. C.5. Technical problems. When there are technical problems with systems used in

Distance Language courses, including Learn Center and Sharepoint site, are there backup systems to permit the Mentor to continue working?

In cases where LearnCenter or SharePoint are down, Mentors may or may not continue working depending on the severity of the issue. However, FSI will not pay for times not worked.

39. C.10. Technical Specifications. Are mentors permitted to work at home, so long as the working space meets the indicated equipment/specifications?

40. C.5. How far in advance are the biweekly pre-semester orientations and mentor meetings announced?

At least two weeks.

41. G.1. Are there any specific meetings the Key Personnel must attend on a routine basis?

No one but the Mentor needs to attend routine meetings.

42. Since this is noted as 'Best Value' procurement, we request that the requirements for past performance be clarified to include a 'Neutral' Rating for those offerors with no past performance. The following acquisition guidance supports this request: "The bare language of 41 U.S.C. § 405(j)(2) suggests that lack of relevant past performance information has no place in a best value selection." "FAR 15.608(a)(2)(iii) provided that:

"[f]irms lacking relevant past performance history shall receive a neutral evaluation for past performance."

Please find attached an updated version of the past performance questionnaire.

43. We are unclear about paragraph B1. Are you awarding only to WOSB, HubZone and

SDVOSB at least five contracts? Or within the entire IDIQ there may be several small businesses and within those at least five classified as WOSB, HubZone, and SDVOSB?

The awarded contractors must have at least one of these business classifications.

44. If the latter is correct are task orders made available first to WOSB, HubZone and

SDVOSB and then made open to the "generic" small businesses secondarily? The procurement states that the OSDBU has determined there are adequate qualified contractors in those groups. Therefore, we are trying to ascertain the likelihood of being awarded business.

The awarded contractors must have at least one of these business classifications.

45. To confirm, we need to submit 8 resumes only, with our response, for mentors currently available. Then, as task orders are issued, do we attach resumes to our responses?

Please review the evaluation factors, as stated “the contractor must submit a sampling of resumes of their management team not to exceed 5 and instructors not to exceed 20 in at least eight (8) languages currently available to perform work at this time”.

Before Task Orders are issued, FSI will request additional resumes, depending on the language requirement.

46. Do we name the languages we can support or just state in proposal we can support 50% and confirm or refuse via task order acceptance or refusal?

Please state both the percentage and identify the languages.

47. As for weekly meetings at FSI, is that for each and every mentor that is teaching at the time of the meeting or may a representative from the contractor i.e. Project Manager attend. If Mentors are required to attend, may the contractor designated Project Manager also attend.

The Mentors are the only ones who should attend the Mentor meetings.

48. Are all instructional material and curriculum's going to be provided by FSI with

"enhancement" material provided by mentor or will mentor be expected to develop their own curriculum and provide all teaching aids materials. If latter what is the turnaround contractor can expect from FSI regarding prior review of materials proposed by mentor.

FSI will provide the materials for the Mentor to use during the course. The Mentor may provide supplementary material if needed by students, provided they have authorization from the COR/GTM to do so.

49. Proposal refers to use of FSI equipment-does that mean Mentors will have access to FSI equipment such as web cameras, headsets, PC's to use off site or only if they are teaching a class from the FSI facility in Arlington.

Mentors must provide their own equipment for off-site work.

50. If a mentor chooses to, may he/she teach his sessions from the FSI facility instead of an offsite location?

Only if authorization by the COR/GTM.