Dear Colleagues,

As a follow-up to what I shared in the last college-wide faculty meeting, I want to communicate that starting (effectively) in 2019, you will need to submit your completed grant proposals 5 days before the funder’s deadline. In anticipation of that, please notify the college and RSC of your intention to submit a proposal three or more weeks in advance, using this link:

  WuFoo Site:      https://utsaresearch.wufoo.com/forms/colfa-business-coehd/

Attached is a copy of what information is requested at this WuFoo link, and a summary description of what happens following the notification 3 weeks out, submission 5 days out, and routing 2 days before the grant deadline.  It is critical we follow these guidelines to ensure timely submissions.

Just as some additional context to the importance of adhering to the University’s 5-2 rule, let me share that with the College now overseeing post-award administration, it is critical that the College have sufficient time to review budgets (especially for adequate administrative costs inclusion) well before the routing process begins. In the past, when the RSC was within the College, this one-stop shop meant those who planned and who would later implement grants were the same. As this is no longer the case, as well as with the increasing number of collaborative, cross-college and inter-institutional projects being submitted, much more time is needed to review project documentation.

Two more points, of particular importance for those who were not in attendance at the last college-wide meeting, relate to running proposals through Research Centers and the benefits of including course buyouts (e.g., instead of or in addition to summer salary) in grants. Please read and think about these two points, and let me know what questions you have.

Research Centers: I want to ask you to consider running your grants through an appropriate Center/Institute, whenever possible, so that an extra 7% of the F&A can be retained by the College, going to support administrative support in that Center. This is totally separate from the 20% of F&A that is distributed to PI (5%), Dept (7%) and College (8%). For instance, when a PI runs her project through the “Center for Comm. Based and Applied Health Research” (as one example), that Center would get 7% of F&A, which provides the PI and Center additional administrative support, effectively cost the PI nothing. There are 4 such Research Centers in our College (see last page of attached F&A policy) and we expect two more—the Urban Education Institute and ATE—designated as such in Spring 2019.

Course buyout and salary savings: The Dean has decided to return to faculty some portion of salary savings from course buyouts that are included in grants. We are not sure yet the percentage (currently comparing other College’s policies to determine what fits with our College’s new approach to centralized grant administration), but imagine that if your course buyout was $12.5K and it cost $2.5K for an adjunct to cover your class, that would leave $10K on the table, and if 25% of that salary savings was returned to the PI each semester, you’d have generated an extra $5,000 for yourself to use (just like PI’s F&A funds), at your discretion.  (Equally helpful, of course, is that the rest to the department and college to cover administrative supports like the statistical consultant we are hiring in the spring and the grants and contracts staff person I hope we can bring in to help us manage grants centrally from here on out.). So please think about including course buyouts in your grants, whenever you can.

Please let me know your thoughts and share any questions you have regarding these changes, plans and policies. And may I wish you happy holidays and a blessed new year to you and your families.

Michael

Michael J. Karcher, Ed.D., Ph.D.
Associate Dean for Research

Professor of Educational Psychology

College of Education and Human Development, University of Texas at San Antonio 
501 Cesar Chavez Blvd., Suite DB 4.337 (DT); MB 3.476 (Main Campus) 
San Antonio, TX 78207 
(210) 458-2032; 458-2650 (department)
michael.karcher@utsa.edu