Guidelines for External Grants

SUNY Oswego prides itself on being a learning-centered institution, whose foundation is excellent teaching scholars.  The most important faculty responsibility is to our students’ learning.  We expect our faculty members to be dedicated to effective teaching and consistently engaged in scholarly and/or creative work.  Because faculty members’ work is often advanced through external grants and reassigned time, the following guidelines were developed in support of the balance between teaching and research on our campus.

1.  Because our primary mission is teaching, faculty members who “buy out” some of their teaching time with external grants are still expected to devote some of their work time to students in the classroom.

            SUNY Oswego is committed to student learning and high quality teaching.  We recruit, retain, and promote faculty members who are good teachers and who want to be involved in promoting student learning within and beyond the classroom.  It is consistent with that philosophy to expect faculty members will teach regularly.

            Faculty members may be occasionally released fulltime from regular teaching through an agreement with the dean that the significance of the grant activity justifies absence from the classroom (though not from the expectation that they will continue to interact with students outside the classroom and contribute service in other ways).  In most cases, a fulltime release would not be a continuing situation, but rather might occur occasionally.

            An exception to this policy on regular teaching would be granted for any person hired to be a fulltime researcher.  Even in this situation, faculty members are expected to interact with students and to participate in the life of the university.

2.  Faculty members are encouraged to include students’ active participation in their research grants.  Whenever possible, resources for student opportunities should be written into grant proposals.

            This is important because engagement in undergraduate/ graduate scholarly and creative work is a goal of the institution.  This practice will help expand opportunities for students to have scholarly experiences, will promote student-faculty interactions, and will contribute to the greater success of our students.

3.  When faculty members are “buying out” their time from teaching to do research, they will request 10% of their annual salary for each course reassignment requested.

            This guideline is important to the institution because the College is continuing to pay the faculty member’s salary.  This percentage recognizes that a salary pays not only for teaching but also for regular research and service responsibilities.  All needed funding to hire adjuncts for the release time of the grant will be transferred from the Provost’s Office to the dean/department and can be used as a grant match. 

By recognizing the true expense of faculty time in each grant, not just the cost of an adjunct replacement, we can create a pool of funding in support of a variety of important projects across the institution, such as new faculty start-up, grant matches, campus grant funding, and more assistantships.  It is also important to note that indirect charges are returned to the College based on the salary dollars requested.  If we ask only for adjunct dollars in external grants, the indirects returned to the College (and ultimately to the PI, department, and dean) are decreased.

            Exceptions to this policy must be approved by the provost and director of ORSP several days before the budget is submitted for signatures by officers of the institution.

May 2007