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The Grant Ready Program was developed during the 2019-2020 academic year to meet one of the college’s Beach 2030 goals, which is to increase our indirect cost return. Briefly, grants are comprised of two parts: direct costs and indirect costs. Direct costs are those costs directly associated with performing grant-related work, such as faculty salaries and benefits, student research assistants, research-related equipment costs, participant incentives, to name a few. Indirect costs are those costs that are not directly attributable to specific grant activities, but which support the research work, including the cost of electricity, building maintenance, campus security, custodial and building services, and administrative support staff not charged to grants as direct costs. Every institution of higher education has a negotiated indirect cost rate which is expressed as a percentage of direct costs; this indirect cost rate is negotiated with the U.S. federal government and considers the various types of indirect support for research provided by the University. É«ÖÐÉ« has a federally negotiated indirect cost rate of 47.5%. Grants awarded to faculty from federal research institutions such as the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation pay the 47.5% indirect rate. Some federal entities, such as the U.S. Department of Education, however, pay 0% indirect cost return. So, receiving funding from a federal agency is not guaranteed to pay the full 47.5% indirect cost return rate. 

Many faculty members do not receive funding from NIH or NSF. States, counties, cities, private foundations, and other such entities may issue contracts for services such as training, and these kinds of contracts and awards pay far less than the 47.5% indirect cost rate. Some may pay 0%, while others pay 8% (federal training grants), 10%, 15% or 20%. Accepting contracts from entities that do not pay the 47.5% rate means that the University is subsidizing the work performed on these awards. 

Currently, CHHS brings in an average indirect cost return of 10.2 % on grants, contracts, and other awards. This is low compared to the 47.5% negotiated rate and is the reason that the Grant Ready program was initiated—the purpose of the Grant Ready program is to identify and incentivize our CHHS faculty to write research grants that bring in the full 47.5%. 

Phase 1 is used to identify faculty with strong publication records in peer-reviewed journals. 

Phase 2 provides summer salary and other costs to help in proposal development for faculty from early and mid-career to the most senior professors. 

Applications for Phase 2 are open now and are available on InfoReady.com through the on chicklet.