Centers and Institutes Procedures

Faculty or, in some instances, staff members, interested in forming a university-based Research Center or Institute should confer with the Office of Sponsored Projects and Research for discussion of procedures and guidelines.

1. Application Process:
   
   All applications shall include:
   1. Organizational Structure: Executive Summary of the scope and purpose of the proposed Center or Institute.
      1. Mission Statement, goals, and objectives that are compatible with ESU's mission and goal statements. Please list 4 goals. Where appropriate the Center or Institute should involve students in their activities and must demonstrate the benefits of these activities for student academic development.
      2. Background, including existing efforts and faculty involved.
      3. Comparison of value added compared to similar or related Centers at ESU or at other institutions as well as of relationships between the proposed Center, the community, and community services.
      4. Description of proposed scholarly program, defined service area and target population. Where multiple services are offered, they may have different service areas and target populations.
      5. Evidence (documentation) of the need for services to be offered. Accepted forms of needs assessment may include: analyses of surveys, testimony from leaders of the target population, secondary sources, and analyses performed by professional organizations, etc.
      6. Description of proposed organizational structure, including leadership and including brief CVs (3 pages max) for primary participating faculty members.
      7. Internal and external letters of support from informed individuals.
      8. Statements of support from relevant department heads and deans.
   2. Budget
   1. Provide an initial three-year budget outlining inputs and outputs. Each Center and Institute will operate on a self-supporting basis utilizing external and/or internally-generated funds. Explain the potential for revenue generation. Centers and Institutes shall have comprehensive plans for exploring and/or securing external grant and contract funding. Externally generated income may include user fees, fees for service, grants, and contracts which will be accounted for to the Center or Institute’s cost Center. Internally generated funds may include funding allocations pledged by the sponsoring department, other departments, or offices of the university. An annual balanced budget will be prepared by the Center or Institute, reflecting projected income and expenditures. Expenditures are to include all costs associated with the operation of the Center or Institute, including but not be limited to, space usage costs, salaries, employee benefits, student employment, supplies, and equipment. All income generated will be credited to the Center or Institute cost center. Where applicable, Centers and Institutes shall provide a fee schedule and estimated income to be generated on a fiscal year basis.
   2. Please list all personnel involved in the operation of the Center or Institute. ESU personnel employed by Centers or Institutes may receive compensation for services rendered. The salary for employees will be identified through the Center's budget proposal and shall not exceed the individual employee's established rate of pay. The employee's primary supervisor must certify that the work performed for the Center or Institute is in addition to and not part of the employee's primary job responsibilities or duties. ESU employees may receive released time from their primary duties to perform work in Centers or Institutes upon the recommendation of the Provost, with the Center or Institute reimbursing the university through a fund transfer. Employees on released time will not receive extra compensation for the same work. All additional work beyond released time for the purposes of work performed for a Center or Institute shall be paid in accordance with the CBA. The assignment of this additional work shall be approved and managed by a senior administrative official, vice president or higher, in order to assure that faculty members fulfill their time commitment to the sponsors as well as fulfilling their time commitment to all university duties. Any additional compensation shall be awarded consistent with applicable Federal, State or Private funder guidelines and limitations. In addition, summer contracts to ESU employees may not exceed an ordinary summer load of 12-13 contract weeks (beginning the first day after the close of the spring semester and ending the last day before the beginning of the fall semester) regardless of the source of funding. All personnel positions shall be funded from income generated by the Center or Institute and will be classified as temporary positions.
   3. Resources available/required (space, equipment, administrative support, cash). All space and facility needs must be identified and resolved at the time a proposal is submitted.
   4. All questions about liability and related issues shall be fully answered. Students and faculty on the University payroll receive standard liability coverage. Persons providing services without compensation from the University must secure individual liability insurance coverage.
   5. An annual review of the Center or Institute’s budget will be completed upon annual review to ensure financial sustainability.
2. Application Review Process and Criteria

1. Process
   
   The review of applications shall proceed through an internal clearance process and will be routed through ESU eGRANTS, the University’s electronic competition and clearance platform also used for grants. Applications will be reviewed upon their receipt by the primary faculty member’s Chair, Dean, Provost (or appropriate Vice President), Vice President for Finance and Administration, and lastly the President.
2. Criteria - Each Center or Institute:
1. Should be organized around a research or scholarly theme of high intellectual timely importance with high potential benefit for research, creative work and education at the University;
2. Ideally involve faculty members from at least three disciplines;
3. Have a clear mission based on the scholarly and research theme;
4. The proposed Director should be a senior faculty member of academic standing, who has demonstrated administrative skills and the ability to raise external funding where that is appropriate;
5. Should not reduplicate the foci or efforts of already existing Research Centers or Institutes.
6. Shall comply with all laws, regulations and policies applicable to the University.

Reporting Guidelines

Annual Review of Centers & Institutes

University Research Centers and Institutes will be reviewed annually. The Center personnel will submit an annual report, identifying activities and accomplishments, specific proposals submitted and grants awarded, and other evidence of meeting the benchmarks and objectives set up when the organization was established. All University Centers and Institutes will report to the Provost.

At the start of the fiscal year, all Centers and Institutes will be asked to provide three to seven goals for the upcoming year linked to ESU’s strategic plan Students First: Empowering Innovation through Collaboration 2017-2020. These goals will be used to create individualized annual report templates, which will be sent to the Centers and Institutes at the end of the fiscal year.

Each Center and Institute will answer the following questions at the beginning of the fiscal year:

• What are your C&I goals this academic year?*
• What is your plan to achieve each goal?
• How will you measure progress/achievement?
• How does each goal map to the University’s Strategic Plan?**

*Each Center and Institute must have at least three and no more than seven measurable goals.

**Each goal must map to at least one tactic of the University’s Strategic Plan.

At the end of the year, an annual report template will ask each Center or Institute to review their submitted goals and provide an update on their program through a goal narrative. In addition, information about personnel, a breakdown of each Center and Institute’s budget in terms of revenue and expenses, and any additional information the Center or Institute directors feel relevant to report, will be collected. See report template below.

New Centers and Institutes will be granted preliminary official status for a three- year period, at which time the Center will undergo a full review by a committee appointed by the Provost in consultation with the Director and Advisory Board of the Center. Thereafter, Centers and Institutes will be reviewed every three (3) years by committees of three to five recognized experts in the areas in which the Center or Institute works. The majority of the members of the review committee and the chair of the committee should be external experts. The Dean, Provost, or appropriate vice president in the case of staff is responsible for appointing the review committees.

The Provost or appropriate vice president will review the committee report and, in consultation with academic leaders (President, dean, Director of Sponsored Projects and Research) determine whether the Center or Institute shall continue for an additional three (3) years. Centers and Institutes may be terminated at the discretion of the University President with or without cause.

If Center is originally operating with University funding, receipt of continuing University funding after three years will be rare, but may be awarded to those Centers which demonstrate their continued, significant contribution to excellent scholarly work, and where appropriate, demonstrate significant growth in their external funding support.

Administration of Research Centers and Institutes

Changes in the by-laws, leadership, or advisory board of any Research Center or Institute must be made in consultation with the Dean, Provost, or applicable Vice President.

Forms

Contact the Director of the Office of Sponsored Projects and Research at (570) 422-7954 or cmcdonald9@esu.edu.

Contacts

Lynne Ozgur, Sponsored Projects & Research and Assistant to the Provost, lozgur@esu.edu, (570) 422-7908