RESEARCH COORDINATING COUNCIL
Memorandum No. 108 as corrected
November 20, 1997
Members Present: Sarah Patrick, Dan Wolfley, Edwin House (presiding)

Members Absent/Excused: Frank Harmon, Richard Holmer, Richard Inouye, Dave Kleist, Paul Zelus

Guest: Dr. Bill Stratton, Dean, College of Business

I. It was MSC (9y, 0n) to approve Memorandum No. 107.

II. REPORTS

A.     Faculty Research Committee - There are three new members - Bob Picard, representative for the College of Business, William Hamlin, representative for the Humanities, and Ernest Lohse, representative for the Social Sciences. The committee has received 14 proposal packets, which will be distributed to members early next week. Dr. House reported that about $30,000 is awarded each semester.

B.     Graduate Student Research and Scholarship Committee - The committee met October 31 and awarded eleven ASISU scholarships. The committee received eighteen research proposals and two dissemination proposals. They will begin review of these proposals tomorrow.

C.     University Research Committee - This committee only meets in the spring--nothing to report.

D.     Research Titles: Faculty Senate recommendation on titles for non-tenure track faculty and research positions - all have survived. This document is currently being reviewed by the Deans’ Council and Vice President Lawson can expect resolution early in the spring semester.

E.     The RFP for the Technology Incentive Grant has been distributed by the Office of Sponsored Programs. This subcommittee serves as internal peer review to improve proposals before going off campus. This time we were more successful than any other institution. Please encourage anyone who uses computers or internet for instruction to submit proposals under this RFP. If someone has submitted a proposal previously, Dr. House hopes they will submit again; chances of funding usually improve.

F.     SBOE - Specific Research Grant Competition. Deadline to the State Board is April 2. Our institutional deadline is in March. Dr. House would like to have proposals submitted by the following areas - physics, chemical engineering, pharmacy, paleontology, health professions. The State Board deadline is December 15; our institutional deadline is November 24. Dr. House did not see any proposals from the humanities, arts, social sciences, College of Business or the College of Engineering

G.     Other - None

 III. COUNCIL BUSINESS A.     Extra Compensation for Faculty - Dean House reported that several years ago RCC made a recommendation to Faculty Senate and the Administration regarding extra compensation for faculty, but it became entangled with Faculty Workload issues. The issue of extra compensation is a serious one with faculty because it is a way they can improve their income. The strict regulations are driving people to open private consulting businesses. RCC recommended that faculty be allowed to charge a private source a higher rate for work performed than a federal source. Financial Services uses federal guidelines for all revenue sources, including state or other non-federal sources. Faculty are concerned about applying federal rules because they want to charge higher rates and work more time than these allow. Currently 50 hours a semester is accepted as the maximum number of hours a faculty member can receive incidental pay during contract days. Dr. Moore recommended a revision to the guidelines stating up to an additional 8 hours/week as reasonable. Working more hours outside the University than this is difficult to justify without using released time. Many faculty feel 50 hours per semester is inadequate. Dean House pointed out that the consulting policy is open-ended as long as the supervisor certifies it doesn’t interfere with a faculty member’s regular duties. Dr. Stratton said according to the faculty activity report, the average faculty member works 40-51 hours/week.

Dr. Stratton said this issue arose when someone in Idaho Falls said several clients could be helped with their businesses and University personnel could provide that assistance. Successful businesses could be assisted with economic development by faculty. The question arose as to whether the University could use a contact place to refer people and broker opportunities. This could also be done on a consulting basis, but using the University accounting service would provide advantages to the University which are (1) people would be more comfortable and (2) the possibility of involving students in real world experience such as internships and part-time employment opportunities. The advantage to the faculty member receiving extra compensation from the University is the additional income would be added to their Social Security base and their retirement base. In contrast, consultants acting independently would have to add fringe benefits to the fee. Advantages to the University are (1) we would be offering this service as a university to the community and (2) it would generate indirect cost funds - a source of flexible funds for Chairs, Deans, and Administration.

Dan Wolfley has a report on how extra compensation is handled at other universities. The larger research universities, such as Montana State University, Washington State University and Utah State University, do not allow extra compensation for their faculty during the academic year. If it is not in the contract, it is not allowed. Two other universities, Northern Arizona and Boise State, do allow a higher hourly rate from private sources. Boise State University does not monitor private funds at all. According to Federal Guidelines A-21, pay regulations within an institution must be consistent. It is difficult to justify charging private sources a higher rate and still demonstrate consistency to auditors. ISU has a more aggressive approach that many other institutions in computing the rate for extra compensation. We are the only school out of 88 to allow holidays and breaks as non-contract days for consulting. A subject currently being discussed in relation to federal guidelines is how to get outside the federal rules when receiving private funds. Dianne Horrocks said the FC&A would like to have this happen but doesn’t believe it’s legal. She would like to see a policy developed if we can make it work under the law. It was MSC (10y, 2 abstentions) for the Council to support the idea of a policy for extra compensation from private sources.

   B.     Data Ownership Issues - There is currently a concern as to who owns the data book when a graduate student is working under a major advisor’s leadership for written dissertation. Does it stay with the University, the major advisor, or the student? Dr. House stated that if a faculty member has a grant and is paying for the work, the faculty member owns it. If it ends up making money or authorship on a manuscript is an issue, data must stay with the University. What should the policy be if a student pays for everything and develops the data? Did the student obtain a degree with the data? What if a student stops halfway through, doesn’t finish, and has a databook? Dr. House asked for recommendations. It was MS to make a recommendation that faculty and students put in writing at the beginning of a professional relationship what that relationship will specifically include, and if such an agreement is not made, the University owns everything. Moved to Amend (10y, 1n, 1 abstention) that default be to the student, not the University. Motion carried unanimously. This recommendation will be taken to Faculty Senate and Deans’ Council.

C.     Dr. Patrick addressed the issues of records management and communication. There is no boilerplate for this. Each one is specific to the research questions involved. Sometimes funding agencies have contacted the Institute requesting information which should be easily accessible but currently is not. For several grants, they have no record of whether they are even awarded or not. Some are continuation grants. What do we need to keep and how long? Dr. House can make recommendations to directors of institutes and centers.

D.     Copyright - Dr. House wanted to let this Council know what he had communicated to Deans’ Council. The Ashcroft Bill is not being acted on this year, but may be early next year. Unless Congress exempts this legislation, whoever is the online provider owns it and is liable for it. This includes student web pages. This legislation comes as a result of treaties that have already been signed. Our copyright policy protects in the traditional mode, but it doesn’t address internet use. It was MSC (12y, 0n) that RCC recommend we retain the current traditional view on ownership of copyrightable materials and extend it to include internet materials.

E.     The Annual Report from the Office of Sponsored Programs was distributed to RCC.
Deb Easterly, Dianne Horrocks, Dean House, and Tebbs Adams are currently working with Bannock Regional Medical Center (BRMC) to provide them assistance with writing grant proposals. BRMC is important to the community and also an employer of our students. In every case where the grant is related to rural health studies, the Institute of Rural Health Studies will help. BRMC has indicated a willingness to pay for these services, and it may be that someone will end up working 100% of the time on this. It was suggested that we find a way for clients to invite the University to assist them. We need friendly policies for the good of both the individual client and the University.

F.     Jeff Meldrum let the Council know that his memo regarding the Social Science/Humanities allocation reflected a majority opinion from Biological Sciences and was not connected to his position as Chair of the Faculty Research Committee.

G.     Committee will meet again in January.

 Adjourned at 5:00 p.m.