Frequently Asked Questions

General Issues

When is the Faculty Grants Office open?
Our office hours are from 8:00 am to 4:30 pm, Monday through Friday.

How can I locate funding sources?
The Faculty Grants Office website has a whole section on this and includes lists of Upcoming Deadlines, access to Online Search Tools, links to many State and Federal Agencies, information on sources of funding at UST Internal, and information on how to seek funding from Corporations and Foundations.

Where can I find grant forms?
Most agencies have application forms on their web sites. You can also find UST-specific forms under the UST Internal Forms section of our website.

How many copies of a grant proposal must be submitted?
This depends upon the agency – check the program solicitation.  In all cases, however, the Faculty Grants Office will need one paper copy of your proposal, and we recommend that you keep a copy for your own files.

What are the mailing options for my proposal?
Increasingly, proposals are being submitted electronically.  In cases where submission of a paper copy is allowed or required, you can either have the Faculty Grants Office mail the proposal for you, or you can assume responsibility for mailing it yourself.  When the FGO mails the package, it will be sent by FEDEX overnight express in most cases.

If I get a grant, who controls it?
If you will be using University resources to carry out your sponsored project, require a reassignment of time for any UST personnel, or the University will serve as the fiscal agent for the grant, the grant or contract is formally awarded to the University of St. Thomas.  The principal investigator is responsible for the intellectual content of a grant and for carrying out the project in a way that is consistent with University policies, agency policies, and the original proposal.

Who can help me with electronic submissions?
The Faculty Grants Office can help you with electronic submissions.

What is the internal review/approval process like, and why do we need to bother with it?
The internal review/approval process is a mechanism that allows for full institutional oversight of all proposals for external grant and contract funding.  Most grant and contract proposals involve the commitment of faculty or staff time and effort, the use of University of resources, and sometimes even University cash.  When submitted as part of a formal grant or contract proposal, these commitments are essentially promises made on the part of the University of St. Thomas to the state or federal government, and the University is responsible for making sure that we are in compliance with all state and federal laws relating to sponsored programs.  All of these commitments have an impact on the University’s budget and its programs, and it is therefore important that University academic and fiscal officers have an opportunity to review and approve proposals prior to their submission to external granting agencies.

The review/approval process itself is quite straight-forward.  You are first asked to discuss your proposed project with your chair.  Once your chair approves your initiative, the Faculty Grants Office helps you fill out a two-page internal form.  You sign it as the principal investigator, and then your dean, the Controller’s Office, the Faculty Grants Office, and the Executive Vice President and Chief Academic Officer review and sign off on your project.  This process—carried out by the Faculty Grants Office--is usually quite quick and can often be completed in a couple of days (although we like to have more time in case key individuals are out of the office or unavailable).  Once your proposal has been fully reviewed and approved, the Faculty Grants Office sends you an e-mail confirming that fact.

What happens if I don’t go through the formal review/approval process before I submit my proposal?
If you do not get full institutional approval prior to the submission deadline for your proposal, the University has several options.  First, if the proposal has not yet been mailed, the University could refuse to send the proposal to the agency.  Second, if the proposal has already been sent to the funding agency, we could institutionally refuse—in whole or in part--any grant or contract that you might win as result of your submission.  Third, if the University chooses, in fact, to accept an award produced by a proposal that was not reviewed prior to submission, your dean and chair will receive a financial penalty in the form of a reduced allocation of indirect costs.  It is just not a good idea to circumvent the review/approval process.

If I submit a grant proposal through the Faculty Grants Office, is it available for anyone to see?
No.  It is considered a piece of intellectual property.  We will release a grant proposal to a third party only if we have signed permission from the principal investigator.  Even when we receive permission to do so, however, we will not release the budget portions of a submitted proposal unless all individuals named in the budget sign a release as well.  This policy is meant to protect your privacy and that of your colleagues. 

The only exceptions to this rule pertain to 1) your chair, 2) the office of academic affairs, 3) the president, and 4) those individuals who have signed off on the proposal during the internal review/approval process.  These individuals have an absolute right to receive a copy of your complete proposal upon request.

Why does the University have to take so much from my grant as “indirect costs?”
Indirect costs recovered from external funding agencies continue to be an irritant and a mystery to many principal investigators.  Why do you “lose” so much money to the University when you get a grant?  First of all, it is important to note that all universities and hospitals collect indirect costs when a grant is awarded – and most external grantmakers readily agree to pay these costs.  Why?  All institutions incur costs when a faculty member carries out a sponsored project: administrative offices (FGO, Corporate and Foundation Relations, the Controller’s Office) support grant projects, sponsored projects use physical facilities and utilities, and a variety of other offices provide indirect support for faculty as they carry out sponsored projects (libraries, registrar’s office, payroll, custodial services, etc.).  None of these costs is directly allocable to a particular sponsored project, but they are all nevertheless very real.  Through a lengthy and very exhaustive process, the federal government determines every five years how we can best estimate these costs and then gives us a percentage and a formula for calculating them.  This process then produces the “indirect cost rate” that we use when submitting proposals to external funding agencies.

What happens to the indirect costs that are collected from my grant?
It is perfectly appropriate for a university to collect indirect costs from a grantmaker and allocate 100% of these funds to its general fund.  The University of St. Thomas, however,

Budgets

Who can help me prepare my budget and answer questions about my budget?
Call David Steele at 2-6038 for assistance developing your budget.

What is the University of St. Thomas’ indirect cost rate?
Our indirect cost rate is 37% of modified total direct costs.

What are “modified total direct costs?”
“Modified total direct costs” is the basis on which we calculate the recovery of indirect costs from external funding agencies.  It is the sum of all direct costs in your budget, MINUS equipment, capital expenditures, charges for patient care, tuition remission, rental costs of off-campus facilities, scholarship and fellowships, and subcontracts to other institutions in excess of $25,000.

What are our current fringe benefit rates?
Information on current fringe benefit rates and how you calculate them are available on the FGO website.

How much time can I devote to grant projects during the academic year?
This is negotiable.  If you are planning to work on a grant project during the academic year (when you are a full-time employee of the University of St. Thomas), you must indicate to the government how much of your effort (a percent of your time) you plan to spend on the grant project.  This diversion of effort must be approved by your chair, your dean, the Controller’s Office, the Faculty Grants Office, and the executive vice president for academic affairs.  If the appointment is approved, a percentage of your salary (commensurate with the level of your actual effort on the grant) will be paid by the grant, and the UST funds that would have covered that percentage of your salary (if you had not received a grant) will be allocated to your department.

What happens to the salary funds that are displaced because I am being paid by a grant?
In most cases, these funds become discretionary funds for use by your chair.

How much time can I devote to grant projects during the summer?
You are free to commit time and effort to grant projects during the months when you are otherwise not being compensated by the University of St. Thomas.  Some agencies, however, restrict you to two months (the National Science Foundation is a good example).

What does the University of St. Thomas consider to be the academic year and what is the summer?
The definition of an “academic year” depends upon your tenure home: