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University Support for Faculty Who Win External Fellowships

Brian Leiter

A philosopher writes:

Since fellowship awards typically get announced this time of year, it might be interesting to consider the following question: What policies or practices does your institution have regarding support of external fellowships in the humanities such as the NEH or ACLS?   Such fellowships typically support around half a senior person’s salary.  What, if anything, does your institution do to help recipients make up the shortfall and secure a full year’s research release?  For example: Does your institution routinely make up the shortfall, or only when the
recipient has accrued sufficient sabbatical credit?  Is the recipient responsible for covering her own benefits, or does your institution cover that?  Details regarding the kind of institution you work at – “research” v. “teaching”, “private” v. “public, etc. – will be especially helpful.

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12 responses to “University Support for Faculty Who Win External Fellowships”

  1. jon kvanvig

    At Texas A&M when I was there, the practice was to use the external funding to hire a replacement, allowing a faculty member to keep his or her full salary (assuming it was higher than the fellowship support). At Missouri, the practice was the same, except for a nice perk: some of the fellowship money could also be used for legitimate research activities associated with the fellowship. In one case, for example, of the 40K for the fellowship, 13K went to the professor as a research expense account. At both institutions, the sense was conveyed that it was standard practice at research universities to make sure faculty aren't penalized financially for succeeding in getting such funding.

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  2. Rob Rupert

    In my experience, Colorado and Texas Tech handle this in the same way Texas A&M does. It was, however, touch-and-go for me at TTU; the topping-off and benefits had to be argued for, instead of being provided as a matter of standard procedure.

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  3. kurt mosser

    My school (University of Dayton) tends to follow the same practice as A the faculty member keeps his or her full salary and the external funds support replacement faculty salary and benefits. One problem I've run across is that if one wins a semester or year-long grant, that replaces the sabbatical, so if one is due for a sabbatical, he or she is pushed back to the end of the line. Not exactly a strong incentive, in many cases.

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  4. Peter Carruthers

    At Maryland we have the same practice – faculty stay on full salary with full benefits, and the money comes to the department to buy replacement teaching.

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  5. Tom Hurka

    My experience at U of Toronto was the same as Jon Kvanvig's — the fellowship (around 35K) was used to cover all my teaching, and I stayed on full salary. Interestingly, I talked to someone at Harvard who had won the same fellowship and got only a half-year off at full pay. So I guess it's worse being at Harvard.

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  6. David Lefkowitz

    My present employer, the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, agrees to pay up to half a person’s salary should he or she receive an external fellowship. As long as the external funding covers a substantial portion of an employee’s salary (even if it is less than half), UNCG also continues to provide full benefits. These terms are offered only to those who go through the internal bureaucratic process as part of their applications for external funding – though the administration is attempting to simplify that process. There is a strong presumption against further funding and teaching releases for those that have benefited from these policies within the last three years. Unlike the other universities mentioned thus far (except for Dayton, I think), UNCG does not have a graduate program in philosophy.

    My experience with UNCG has been very positive. I recently accepted a fellowship for the 08/09 academic year in an amount exceeding half my current salary. The administration agreed to pay half my salary, and allow me to keep the full amount provided by the external fellowship. This brings me to the point I think most important to share, at least for those that have never been awarded a fellowship before – if the fellowship involves residence at another institution, it can be very costly! I don’t think I am that naïve (though I could be wrong about that), but I have consistently underestimated just how expensive it can be, once you add in travel, maintaining two residences, moving costs (e.g. all those files you’ve amassed as you work toward writing your book), and so on. My university’s ability to help defray these costs is constrained by state accounting rules – for instance, they can give me a small amount of money for a one time relocation, but they are barred from covering the cost of travel if I elect to commute weekly (as I will be doing). Obviously this point does not apply equally to everyone – if you are currently renting a place and willing (and able) to move (your family) for a short time period, the added costs may be few. Still, many residential fellowships are in places with a high cost of living (e.g. Cambridge MA, Princeton, Palo Alto), so you may find yourself paying twice the rent on the same salary.

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  7. Justin D'Arms

    Same here: Ohio State paid my full salary and benefits and the fellowship money was returned to my department to cover replacement teaching. I just learned, however, that had I been eligible for sabbatical that year, I would have had to use my sabbatical as well.

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  8. Chuck Cross

    The posts I've read seem to indicate that fellowship funding is or at least can be routed through the recipient's institution rather than paid directly to the recipient by the funding organization. If that's correct, it surprises me. Someone in my department who got a fellowship was allowed to retain his entire salary and benefits in exchange for turning the fellowship over to the university (which then covered his teaching and let him use most of the rest for expenses). It turned out that the fellowship had to be paid directly to him, so in order to hold up his end of the arrangement he had to donate the entire fellowship to the university. He then had to report a huge income and a huge charitable contribution on his tax return.

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  9. Tom Hurka

    Re Chuck Cross:

    My fellowship was paid directly to me, and then I wrote a cheque to my department, which used the money to cover my teaching. And there were no tax implications. In both Canada and the U.S.fellowships are tax-exempt: I was sent a form explaining that.

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  10. Steven Gross

    Tom:

    Unless I'm very confused, fellowships are not generally tax-exempt in the US. They *were* tax-exempt prior to 1986. Post-1986, they are taxable except for portions used to pay tuition, fees, and the like. That said, I believe the rules are somewhat different for non-resident aliens — which might explain the letter you received.

    I hasten to add that, as perhaps goes without saying, I'm no tax expert! Someone please correct me if I've got this wrong. But I thought I'd better post up at least a warning that people should check with a tax expert before assuming that fellowships are tax exempt.

    Best,
    Steven

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  11. Dana Hollander

    One problem with receiving outside fellowships at McMaster University (Hamilton, Ontario, Canada) is that one's eligibility for sabbatical is then postponed by the same period of time that one had an externally funded research leave. So, while there is tremendous pressure at my institution to seek external research funding, we are penalized when we get grants that buy us the time we need to complete the research goals we set when writing our SSHRC funding proposals. Is this also the rule at other Canadian universities?

    Also – a more general question for North American institutions – when fellowship funding is received for the period for which one is eligible for a sabbatical, are faculty permitted to postpone the university-funded sabbatical, or must they take both concurrently?

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  12. Tom Hurka

    Dana:

    Those rules sound very punitive. At U of Toronto I had a half-sabbatical scheduled for winter 2007 but then got a fellowship for all of 2006-07. The university let me stay on full salary and postpone the sabbatical, while continuing to earn credit toward future sabbaticals while on the fellowship, so there was no sacrifice on my part at all. I could in fact have taken the half-sabbatical right after the fellowship ended, but thought I owed my department some teaching and am doing that this year.

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