The Maxwell Dean’s Office encourages faculty to apply for external funding, particularly grants and contracts that (1) further a faculty member’s research agenda and enhance students’ educational experiences and (2) lead to scholarly publications for faculty and students or to thesis or dissertation research for students.
Faculty Course Buyouts
Faculty members sometimes receive grants or fellowships that cover a substantial part of, but not all of, a semester or year’s salary. Below are guidelines that govern how the Dean’s Office responds to requests to be relieved of teaching in exchange for grant funds of these types. Requests for buyouts should be prepared by the faculty member and forwarded to Associate Dean Andrew London by the department chair with the chair’s rationale for approval. These requests must be received by March 15 for the fall term and by October 15 for the spring term.
Each department should have a fair and consistent process for reviewing and handling course buyouts in consideration of balancing department needs with individual needs. In consultation with the Dean’s Office, the department chair has the authority to approve or deny buyouts based on overall departmental needs including continuity of course offerings. Course buyouts should not adversely affect the operations and functions of the department.
The price of a buyout of one course is 12.5 percent of a faculty member’s 8.5-month salary plus fringe benefits, the sum of which is billed to a grant. For large grants, additional course releases may be required. The second increment of release time costs an addition 15 percent of base salary plus fringe benefits; a third costs an additional 20 percent of base salary plus fringe benefits. Given the educational mission of the Maxwell School, buyout arrangements for four courses in an academic year rarely will be granted.
Consistent with the University’s effort-reporting policy, the Maxwell School uses the actual salary and compensation of a faculty member who seeks to bill teaching and research time to the grant. However, in cases where the granting agency imposes a salary cap limiting the amount of salary and fringe benefits that can be charged to the grant, the Maxwell School will abide by the salary cap. To be explicit, faculty with salaries below the granting agency’s cap will be charged for release time at the appropriate percentage of actual salary plus allowable fringe benefit charges. Faculty with salaries above a granting agency’s cap will be charged for release time at the appropriate percentage of the granting agency’s salary cap plus allowable fringe benefit charges.
Please keep in mind as well the following conditions:
- A faculty member buying out of a course is expected to participate fully in service and administrative duties; the buy-out is strictly for teaching and must not be construed as approval for a full-time appointment to research. The policy outlined in this document is for partial release from coursework while a person is in residence at the University and fulfilling all other duties, except for the course.
- If a faculty member’s course load is not symmetric (i.e., not constant across semesters), a course buyout cannot be done for the semester in which the course load is lighter. For example, if a faculty member teaches one course in one semester and two courses in the other, a one-course buyout must be for the semester in which the higher load is taught.
- A course buyout cannot be used in conjunction with an appointment to research leave, educational leave, administrative leave, or leave without pay.
Fringe Benefits and Facilities and Administrative Costs on Grants and Contracts
To ensure that proposers develop budgets with appropriate rates as described below, the SU Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP) requires that the campus community use the OSP Budget Template. Use of the OSP Budget Template greatly reduces common arithmetic errors often encountered with other budget tools.
In addition to salary, fringe benefits should be charged to all sponsors in direct proportion to an individual's effort devoted to a sponsored project; see the University's current negotiated rates.
The term facilities and administrative (F&A) costs is the official term that universities use for recovery of costs associated with facilities and administrative services that are devoted to sponsored research activity. F&A rates are negotiated between the federal government and the University based on complex calculations that determine the amount of University resources that support research. Terms such as "overhead," "indirect costs," and "administration costs" are often used interchangeably to describe F&A costs. Funds provided by outside sponsors of research, instruction, public service, or other services must include an appropriate amount to offset F&A costs incurred by the University; see the University's current negotiated rates. The University will accept a reduced F&A rate if the outside sponsor’s limitation is available as published documentation in a public domain applicable to all awardees. Rare exceptions to this policy require approval by the divisional chair or director, the Dean's Office, and the University's Office of Research.
Graduate Student Compensation
Salary or Wage Norms
GA rates for Maxwell for AY 20-21: For a full year (fall and spring) 20-hour GA, the PhD rate will be $21,000 and the MA rate is $16,250 with 24 credit hours of tuition. Full year GA’s at 10 hours and 20-hour GA’s for one semester would be half that salary amount and number of tuition credits. 10 hour GA’s for a single semester will be ¼ of the salary and tuition credits listed above. To budget for AY21-22 (and out-years), increase by 3%.
It is at the PI's discretion ... $20 per hour
Tuition
Budgeting tuition in some or all project years depends on whether you anticipate keeping the same graduate student for the length of the project and/or where the student is in their program. For instance, if the project responsibilities you envision for the GA require an advanced graduate student (ABD), there is no need to budget tuition given that the student is no longer taking coursework. Of course, it is just as likely as not to not know at the proposal stage who the GA will be, should the project be funded. So, you might consider whether you want the flexibility to hire a student that needs tuition covered, just in case. In the event that you end up hiring a student who is not taking coursework, at least on most federal grants, you can move those tuition funds to another direct-cost category, like hourly student work, travel, or publication costs.
Unless a sponsor prohibits tuition as an allowable cost on the grant, and especially if the sponsor does not limit the amount of direct costs, the grant should bear the full cost of tuition. However, it is not uncommon across campus for a school or college to provide up to half of tuition costs (12 credit hours) on grants with full indirect cost recovery (i.e., the sponsor does not disallow or cap the University’s federally negotiated F&A rate), including in Maxwell. In other words, the Dean’s Office recognizes that tuition is expensive and can sometimes consume too much of the budget and, as such, expects to provide some tuition in some cases.
PIs should seek prior approval from Andrew London early in the budget development process before assuming cost share of tuition. Documentation on the IRR at the time of submission is not sufficient.
If you know with certainty that the student who will be working on the grant is “all but dissertation” (ABD) and therefore does not need tuition, you do not need to budget for tuition.