The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS)/Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) National Emergency Training Center (NETC)/Emergency Management Institute (EMI) intends to negotiate on a Sole Source basis, under the authority of Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 13.106-1(b) with the American Council on Education (ACE) located at One DuPont Circle, N.W. Suite 250, Washington D.C., 20036. For purchases not exceeding the simplified acquisition threshold, contracting officers may solicit from one source if the contracting officer determines that the circumstances of the contract action deem only one source reasonably available. The intended procurement will be classified under North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) 611710 with a Small Business Size Standard of $15.0 million. DHS/FEMA intends to issue a non-competitive award that will result in a purchase order with a period of performance of date of award through 12 months. ACE reviews EMI's resident and off-site resident courses to determine their eligibility for inclusion in the National Guide for Education Credit for Training Programs. EMI students who are enrolled in a degree program at a university may request that the ACE recommendation for an EMI course be applied as credit toward their degree. This arrangement enhances career development for the student and academic status for EMI's curriculum. For EMI resident courses, EMI students can obtain transcripts from the NETC Admissions Office. The two general objectives for ACE review of EMI curricula are to: 1) Ensure the compatibility of EMI training with national college-level academic standards; and 2) Provide support for students from emergency management organizations to enter and continue college degree programs. This notice of intent to sole source is not a request for competitive quotes and no solicitation document exists for this requirement. All parties interested in responding to this notice shall: 1) Include information on the proposed services which clearly states that you are able to meet the requirements outlined below; and 2) Fully explain your capabilities and qualifications by submitting a detailed capability statement by the due date and time. • Contractor must have a College and University network base of at least 1,800 higher education institutions that consider their credit recommendations for transfer to degree programs. • The College and Universities that are in their network base must be nationally represented throughout the United States. • Contractor must show that they have a long-standing relationship with the educational organizations that they perform credit recommendation services for. • Contractor must accept the credit recommendation given to EMI courses that were previously reviewed and awarded by another organization (ACE). • Contractor must have an online guide which lists all EMI courses that have received credit recommendations. This guide must include course information for each course; i.e., course name, course code, length of course, course description, objective, learning outcome, credit recommendation. • Contractor must maintain the online guide so that it provides up-to-date, public access to the entire database of EMI courses. • Contractor must award credit recommendations in various categories; i.e., vocational, associate, baccalaureate, graduate. • Contractor must be immediately able to provide an electronic transcript service for NETC students, which will be sent to the student's college or university. Responses to this synopsis shall be submitted by email as a MS Word or Adobe PDF attachment only to: Laura Harshbarger, Contract Specialist,
[email protected] and Gary Topper, Contracting Officer,
[email protected]. Capability statements are due by 4:30 PM EST, December 10, 2014. All capability statements received by the closing date of this notification will be considered by the Government. Submissions after this date will not be considered. Telephone or facsimile requests for information will not be considered. A determination by the Government not to compete based on responses to this notice is solely within the discretion of the Government. Information received will normally be considered solely for the purpose of determining whether to conduct a competitive procurement. All Contractors doing business with the Federal Government must be registered in the System for Award Management (SAM) database. Registration is free and can be found online at https://www.sam.gov/portal/public/SAM/.