Functional Statements > Office of the Chief Financial Officer

E.  CONTRACTS AND ACQUISITIONS MANAGEMENT

Contracts and Acquisitions Management (CAM) is responsible for the solicitation, award, administration, and closeout of all contracts and other acquisition instruments for the Department including the ten Regional Offices, but excluding FSA. The office’s mission is to satisfy its customers by timely delivery of the best value products and services while maintaining the public's trust and fulfilling public objectives.
In carrying out its responsibilities, the Immediate Office:

• Develops, recommends, establishes, implements, and maintains acquisition policies, regulations, procedures, and procurement performance measures for the Department, including FSA, consistent with applicable Federal and Departmental laws, regulations, guidelines and procedures.
• Provides guidance on and interpretation of acquisition related policies issued by the Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP), General Services Administration, Office of Management and Budget, and other authorities.
• Supports ED principal offices’ missions and goals within applicable Federal and Departmental laws, regulations, guidelines and procedures.

The Director, CAM, reports to the CFO. The Director is responsible for the overall management of the Department’s procurement functions and provides leadership and coordination to the immediate office staff and to the following components:

Program Contracts Group;
Operations Contracts Group;
Education Science Contracts Group;
Performance and Logistics Group.

Program Contracts Group/ Operations Contracts Group/ Education Science Contracts Group

Each of the Contracting Groups provides contracting and acquisition support to designated client offices.

In carrying out its responsibilities, each group:

• Develops acquisition plans in conjunction with program offices and advises clients on the preparation of requirement descriptions (statements of work), contractor performance measures, evaluation criteria and other aspects of the procurement process.
• Prepares and issues acquisition solicitations, reviews incoming proposals and bids for conformity with requirements, and advises program offices in the evaluation of these materials.
• Negotiates with offerors, performs pre-award reviews as necessary to assess the technical and business management capacity of offerors, makes source selection decisions, and awards contracts and other acquisition instruments and debriefs offerors.
• Administers acquisition instruments including monitoring, providing assistance, reviewing and accepting interim and final deliverables and reports, reviewing and approving payments, assessing overall contract performance, reviewing and approving modifications, executing terminations as necessary, and closing out contracts.

Performance and Logistics Group
The Group provides support internally to the agency’s Senior Procurement Executive and other Contracts and Acquisition Management (CAM) staff, and externally to the Department’s principal offices.  In carrying out its duties, the Group:

• Coordinates the certification programs for the Department’s Acquisition Professionals (i.e. contracting officers, Contracting officer’s representatives, and project managers).
• Prepares, publishes, and controls ED guides, handbooks, brochures, internet web site content and other materials governing the agency’s acquisition processes.
• Administers the Department's Government purchase card.
• Coordinates the agency’s electronic commerce activities.
• Reviews CAM solicitations and pre-award contract documents for compliance with the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) and other applicable regulations and statutes.
• Conducts internal reviews of agency acquisition activities.
• Maintains the electronic contract data requirements for agency automated management systems and preparing internal and external procurement performance reports.
• Administers contract closeout activities.

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