400-10 Academic, Legal, and Financial Policies of Contracts and Grants

Effective Date: 1/1/92 (revised 1/10/01)

Office of Origin: Office of Research Administration

I. Purpose

To ensure appropriate scientific and financial management of research, training, and other extramurally funded projects, the solicitation, acceptance, and administration of funds for the support of such projects are subject to academic, legal, and financial policies promulgated by The Regents.

II. Definitions

Contract: an exchange of promises that gives rise to legally enforceable rights and duties. A contract is usually a binding agreement under which the sponsor provides funding for a proposed program in return for a product (e.g., services, scientific report). Contracts are specific in the nature of the work to be done, the manner in which it is carried out, and the conditions of termination. Under a fixed-price contract, the sponsor and the University agree in advance on the price of the work to be done. A cost-reimbursement contract reimburses the University for actual costs of conducting the project.

Direct costs: those costs that can be identified specifically with a particular sponsored research or training project. These costs include, but are not limited to: salaries and wages, employee benefits, consultants, animal care and use, radioisotope use and disposal, supplies and expenses, travel, equipment, publication costs, and off-campus rent.

Fellowship: a stipend awarded to a pre- or post-doctoral student to allow training or advanced study in research. Fellowship awards may also include an institutional allowance to pay for some of the costs related toward that fellow's research or training.

Grant: an award of financial or direct assistance to an eligible investigator in support of proposed research, training, or other activity. The sponsor generally does not require a predetermined product at the completion of the work, although it may require financial and/or technical reports.

Indirect costs: those costs that have been incurred for common or joint objectives and that cannot be identified specifically with a particular project. These include costs of supporting activities such as maintenance and operations of the physical plant, use allowance for buildings and equipment, general, departmental, and sponsored projects administration and expenses, and library and student services.

Instruction: training of students, personnel, or prospective employees in research, or in the techniques or practices pertinent to the particular area of concern.

Other sponsored activities: public service assistance given for the purpose of organizing, establishing, providing, or expanding the delivery of services to a specified community or area; also, projects which do not clearly fit into the "research" or "instruction" categories.

Patent: a grant by a sovereign nation to an inventor giving the inventor the right to exclude others from making, using, and/or selling the invention for a period of time.

Principal investigator: the individual ultimately responsible for the appropriate scientific and financial conduct of a sponsored research project. On occasion, there may be co-principal investigators who share responsibility for the project.

Program administrator: the coordinator of a program involving more than one project.

Project administrator or project director: the head of a training or public service project.

Research: investigation or experimentation aimed at the discovery of generalizable new knowledge, the interpretation of facts, and/or the revision of accepted theories in the light of new facts; or the testing of such new or revised theories.

Sponsor: an entity that provides funds to the University to support the conduct of a project.

Subcontract: a contract between the University and a prime grantee or prime contractor for the provision of goods or services which the prime grantee or contractor is unable to provide. This may be done either by a purchase order or by a contractual agreement, and will include the applicable regulations of the prime funding agency as well as the requirements of the prime recipient.

III. Policy

A. Academic

1. General

To accomplish its aims of providing higher education, advancing knowledge, and contributing to the welfare of the state, the University accepts funds and enters into agreements only when:

a. such undertakings provide its faculty members with the opportunity to gain experience and knowledge of value to their teaching and research;

b. the projects are suitable research through which the individual faculty member may make worthy contributions to knowledge; or

c. appropriate public service is performed.

2. Leadership of a sponsored project

An essential qualification of principal investigators who propose to head an extramurally supported research, training, or public service project is that they will personally participate in it to a significant degree. It is contrary to University policy, and is viewed with extreme disfavor by sponsors, to list as head of a project an individual, however prestigious that person may be, who will contribute only a nominal portion of time and effort to the furtherance of the work.

3. Limitation on leadership of a sponsored project

Only members of the Academic Senate and certain other academic and staff employees are eligible to serve as principal investigators on extramurally sponsored projects (see Administrative Policy 400-11, Eligibility to Submit Proposals for Extramural Funds).

4. Rights to results of extramural projects (publication and copyrights)

a. General

Copyrightable material developed by faculty and staff members, either in conjunction with or aside from their University employment, shall be the property of the author unless the material is prepared under special contractual arrangements or as a specific part of a University assignment. A faculty member's general obligation to produce scholarly works does not constitute such a specific assignment.

b. Unacceptable limitations on freedom to disseminate results

Normally, a contract or grant is unacceptable if it limits the freedom of the author to publish without restriction. Examples of limitations a sponsor may attempt to impose are:

1) assigning ownership of results to the sponsor;

2) assigning the final decision as to what may be published to the sponsor; or

3) placing an unreasonably long or unlimited delay period on the publication or dissemination of the information resulting from the work under the project.

c. Exceptions to unacceptable limitations

The Chancellor may make exceptions to the policy stated above, or recommend exceptions in cases where contract or grant authority has not been delegated to the Chancellor, when one or more of the following conditions have been met:

1) security considerations in the national interest are involved;

2) the sponsor reserves first right of publication, but only if there is a provision surrendering this right to the University after a reasonable interval of time, in the event the sponsor has not published within that time; or

3) when other special or extraordinary circumstances prevail which do not involve censorship of the results of the project. These should be judged on their merits with respect to the reasons given for any restriction on publication.

B. Legal

1. General

The Regents are empowered by law to accept contracts and grants on behalf of the University. Therefore, contracts or grants for sponsored projects or programs are awards to the corporation (i.e., The Regents), and commitments made under agreements are of the corporation. It follows that University policies govern the administration of all actions under these grants or contracts unless the provisions thereof impose other more restrictive requirements.

2. Policy on the award and acceptance of contracts and grants

a. It is the policy of The Regents that awards of contracts and grants for research done by University employees will be made to The Regents, not to the principal investigator.

b. Occasionally, a sponsor may offer a grant to an individual faculty member. Consistent with considerations of conflict of interest, faculty members are free to make agreements concerning that portion of their time and effort which is not committed to the University and which does not involve use of University space and facilities for non-University purposes.

c. An award to an individual made payable to the University cannot be accepted unless there is compliance with applicable University policies such as the recovery of employee fringe benefits.

C. Financial

1. General

It is University policy that research and other extramurally funded projects be done at no cost to the University. All direct and indirect costs incurred in the performance of extramurally funded projects shall be recovered from the sponsor. This policy shall be applied in a fashion which best accommodates the policies and objectives of both The Regents and the sponsor. Proposals for programs to be funded by agencies whose policies do not allow for the University's required provisions for retirement and other fringe benefits, or for indirect costs, must be approved by the Office of the President upon recommendation of the Executive Vice Chancellor. They will only be approved if they merit the resultant subsidy by the University of those costs which are associated with the projects, but which the sponsor will not reimburse.

2. Indirect costs

Indirect cost rates for all projects financed through private and public grants and contracts are negotiated periodically with the Department of Health and Human Services. Current rates are available from the Office of Research Affairs.

IV. Responsibility

V. Related Policies

• Patents (Policy 100-25) (under revision)
• Copyrights (Policy 100-26) (in progress)
• Disclosure of Financial Interests in Private Sponsors of Research (Policy 100-27) (under revision)
• Transfer of Biological Materials (Policy 100-28) (under revision)
• Conflict of Interest (Policy 150-10)
• Expenditures of Extramural Funds (Policy 300-19)
• General University Travel (Policy 300-37)
• Eligibility to Submit Proposals for Extramural Funds (Principal Investigator Status) (Policy 400-11)
• Authority to Solicit Contracts and Grants (Policy 400-12)
• Proposal Content Requirements for Contracts and Grants (Policy 400-13)
• Administrative Review and Submission of Contracts and Grants (Policy 400-15)
• Award Acceptance and Execution of Contract and Grants (Policy 400-16)

VI. References

• UCSF Campus Code of Conduct
  
• Contract and Grant Manual, Office of the President
• UCSF Office of Research Administration Website
• University of California Accounting Manual, Office of the President
• University of California Faculty Handbook, Office of the President