College funds are available to providing matching support for seed funding offered by other units within Penn State (e.g., colleges, institutes, centers). These funds are intended to support the research activities of individuals who have research responsibilities as part of their faculty appointment. The funding is for support of activities that will lead to new proposals for external funding to expand these efforts.
Matching funds from the college must typically be used to support students, but it may also cover other expenses required for the research, e.g., human subject payments as required. Equipment or software is only covered if the proposal can make a case that it is absolutely necessary and not otherwise available. Other expenses may be covered on a case-by-case basis at the discretion of the college. Travel to conferences is generally not covered. If a paper produced by the research has been accepted for presentation at a top conference, the PIs need to apply for a supplement later on that may be funded at the discretion of the college, but typically, the college will not fund travel while matching seed funding.
The College will provide the following:
- A 1:1 match for grants that only involve IST faculty.
- For projects that involve faculty from other colleges, the match will be proportional to the ratio of the number of IST faculty to the total faculty involved in the project. Here the goal is for the other colleges will also provide a match, so the end result would be a 1:1 match (or more).
- Matches of up to $15K will be approved by the Associate Dean for Research.
- Matches of more than $15K require additional approvals, which are initiated by the Associate Dean for Research.
- If the seed grant has an end date, our matching funds will use the same end date. If there are extensions to the seed grant, we will consider extending the matching fund expiration date.
- If the seed grant has no end date, our matching funds will expire after one year. We will consider extensions.
- Our matching funds are always the last dollars spent. So, if someone gets a $25K grant and a $25K match,
- If they spend $15K by the expiration date, we will reclaim our $25K leaving them with the remainder of the $10K from the other source.
- If they spend $35K by the expiration date, we will reclaim the remaining $15K leaving them with no additional funding.
- Faculty associated with seed grant proposals, regardless of role, are expected to contribute financial resources in support of seed funding efforts if they have discretionary funds. The expectation is that the sum of the faculty contributions will provide up to 50% of the college match, assuming sufficient discretionary funds are available among the faculty involved. How much each individual contribute is up to the faculty associated with the proposal. All faculty controlled discretionary funds available at the time the proposal is submitted are considered as sources of matching funds (e.g., RIF, salary savings, endowments).
For each individual, the following funds are exempted from this matching requirement:
- Start-up funds,
- Gift in support of specific projects,
- Credit-related discretionary funds,
- The first $25K of any other discretionary funds.
By default, for any fiscal year, college matching funds through this program will be limited to a total of $60K per individual whether they serve as PI or co-PI or in any other role. For the purpose of this requirement, if there are n IST faculty associated with the project, 1/n of the matching funds are assigned to each member of the IST faculty.
Approved by: Dr. Andrew Sears, Dean, 10/12/2018
Revised & Approved by: Dr. Andrew Sears, Dean 04/13/2020