SCAC Award Application
Rev. 8/1/08
Faculty are invited and encouraged to apply for support for their scholarly and creative activities. The Scholarly and Creative Activity Committee (SCAC) oversees processes for three distinct internal award programs at CSULB. Applications for all SCAC awards will take place once per year in the Fall Semester. Details regarding the three types of awards currently supported are provided below. Faculty may apply for only one award per application cycle.
ELIGIBILITY
All full-time unit-three faculty are eligible to apply for a Scholarly and Creative Activity Committee (SCAC) Award. This includes full-time lecturers and librarians. Probationary tenure track faculty in their first two years of service at CSULB who have a reduced workload supported by Academic Affairs during the current academic year (2008-2009) are not eligible to apply for assigned time SCAC awards. However, they may apply for summer stipend and mini-grant SCAC awards. Faculty participating in the Faculty Early Retirement Program (FERP) are eligible to apply for Mini-Grants or Assigned Time awards, but they may not apply for Summer Stipend SCAC awards. Faculty in FERP status must be in active service during the semester they take the Assigned Time award or expend Mini-Grant funds. Faculty and full-time department chairs on 12-month appointments may not apply for Summer Stipend SCAC Awards, but may apply for other awards.
A Report of Work Accomplished must be on file for all previous Scholarly and Creative Activity awards in order for an applicant to receive an award.
ACTIVITIES SUPPORTED
The following activities are eligible for all Scholarly and Creative Activities Awards:
Basic Research
Applied Research
Creative Activities in the Arts
The following activities are ineligible for any Scholarly and Creative Activities Awards:
Curricular development or improvement including pedagogical research
Department or college programs or facilities
Completion of requirements for an advanced degree
Community service
TYPES OF AWARDS
Mini-Grants
Mini-Grants provide the faculty with funds for student assistance, bibliographic research, travel, supplies, minor equipment, and computer time to test promising ideas and obtain preliminary results leading to the application for external support. At present, Mini-Grant budgets are limited to a maximum of $5500. Mini-Grant funds must be expended by the end of the next academic year. Mini-Grants are "seed money," and, therefore, acceptance of a Mini-Grant requires that the application for external funding based on the proposal be submitted within two years of the date of the award. All awardees must file a Report of Work Accomplished for activities conducted under the award.
Summer Stipend Award
A Summer Stipend Award provides faculty with financial support during the summer months for scholarly or creative activities. A Summer Stipend Award is equal to one-month salary for 3 WTUs at the University’s standard “vacant rate” prevailing at the time of application. This award is subject to federal and state income tax. Summer Stipend applicants must have 30 consecutive days available in the summer following application when they do not have additional employment in the CSU or an auxiliary. All awardees must file a Report of Work Accomplished for activities conducted under the award.
Assigned Time Award
An Assigned Time Award provides 3 units of assigned time intended to relieve the faculty member of one 3 unit teaching assignment in order to complete the proposed project. The 3 unit award may be taken in the Fall Semester or the Spring Semester of the academic year following application. However, the specific course that will be re-assigned to another instructor must be determined in consultation with the chair of the faculty member’s department. Assigned Time awards may not be converted to Summer Stipend or cash awards. The scholarly or creative activity completed must be documented by a Report of Work Accomplished.
APPLICATION INSTRUCTIONS
NOTE: A failure to follow the application instructions may adversely influence the evaluation of your proposal.
Faculty may use the form obtained at the web link at the end of this document to submit applications or may prepare a facsimile provided that the content, format, and length of the attached form are observed.
Application
The first page of the application includes personal information. Note: the current application requests that you enter the month and year that you were hired as a tenure-track faculty at CSULB. This is being requested for the purpose of determining your eligibility for an assigned time award. The next two pages include the text of the proposal. The fourth and fifth pages include a faculty history covering the last three years. The sixth page applies only to applications for Mini-Grants and includes the proposed Mini-Grant budget. The remaining pages are reserved for reporting the evaluations of the College SCAC and the College Dean.
The application should be prepared using 12-point type and one-inch margins. Applicants should bear in mind that proposals are read and evaluated by the College SCAC, the College Dean, and the University SCAC. As such, proposals should be written so that they are intelligible to faculty from diverse disciplines across the University. A total of FIVE (5) copies of the application are required, one copy is retained by the Department and the other four copies including the completed College SCAC and College Dean evaluation pages are delivered to the Office of University Research. Do not submit blank pages. Reports of Work Accomplished for previous SCAC awards should not be forwarded with the Application. Send Reports of Work Accomplished directly to the Office of University Research.
APPLICATION CATEGORIES
Indicate the cluster that best fits your proposal.
Cluster A. Basic or Applied Research in natural sciences, engineering or mathematics.
Cluster B1. Applied Research in business administration, health, human services, education, public administration, or library scholarship.
Cluster B2. Basic Research in humanities, social sciences, fine arts scholarship.
Cluster C. Creative Activity in fine arts and creative writing.
THE EVALUATION PROCESS
Applications are first rated by the College SCAC then given to the College Dean who reviews the ratings and writes an evaluation. The complete proposal is signed by both the College SCAC Chair and Dean before being sent to the Office of University Research. Each application is evaluated in terms of the project description, methodology, significance, anticipated results, and goals using the evaluation criteria described below.
EVALUATION CRITERIA (total of 50 points)
Proposal Content (40 points)
Description of the research, scholarship or creative activity. Include purpose and hypotheses if appropriate. (5 points)
Background and need or significance of the research, scholarship, or creative activity. Summarize previous work on this topic. Indicate whether project breaks new ground or is part of continuing activity. Indicate the nature of its contribution to the discipline. (15 points)
Research design, methodology, or kind of creative activity to be undertaken. Include timeline and feasibility of project within timeline. Include the nature of involvement of CSULB students in the project, if any. (15 points)
Anticipated outcomes and goals of the activity. Outcomes include papers, presentations, publications, performances, and persuasive proposals to external agencies, etc. Goals include ongoing implications of this line of activity. (5 points)
Faculty History (evaluated relative to rank – 10 points)
- Include the last three years beginning in September.
- Include complete citations of publications, conference presentations, exhibitions, compositions and the like for the last three years. Co-authors should be acknowledged when applicable and it should be noted whether a publication was refereed or non-refereed.
- Professional qualifications, including awards and honors may be listed.
- Report specific tangible outcomes from previous campus administered grant, fellowship, or stipend awards.
- Also list all current and pending internal and external support for your scholarship.
General
Proposal Clarity and Completeness is evaluated as an integral part of proposal content.
Is the proposal complete and intelligible to faculty members outside of the discipline? Did the applicant follow application instructions?
NOTE: A failure to follow the application instructions may adversely influence the evaluation of your proposal.
EVALUATION BY THE COLLEGE SCAC
The college SCAC rates the proposals on a 0-50 point scale using the evaluation criteria above. The final rating recorded on the proposal is normalized using an algorithm and spread sheet provided to the College by the Office of University Research so that each College’s set of ratings has a mean of 50 and a standard deviation of 10 points. College committees are encouraged to record comments on individual proposals in the space provided.
EVALUATION BY THE COLLEGE DEAN
The College Dean records comments on each proposal in the space provided. These comments should indicate points of agreement/disagreement with the ratings and comments from the College SCAC. The Dean may provide additional comments as well. A spread sheet (format provided by the Office of University Research) is prepared by each College containing applicant names, department, proposal title, type of award and the College SCAC ratings. The spread sheet is transmitted to the Office of University Research by the deadline listed below. Four copies of each proposal including signature of the College SCAC Chair and comments from the College Dean must be delivered to the Office of University Research by the deadline listed below.
EVALUATION BY THE UNIVERSITY SCAC
Each application is rated independently by three members of the University SCAC using the criteria above. In rating each application, the members of SCAC read the application along with the input from the College SCAC and the College Dean. The ratings by each member are normalized as described above regarding the College SCAC ratings. The normalized ratings are then averaged with the college SCAC ratings. The overall averaged ratings are used to form the final ranking by the University SCAC.
UNIVERSITY DEADLINES - Fall Semester 2008
Monday, September 15, 2008 -- Reports of Work Accomplished for Assigned Time SCAC awards taken in 2007-08 due in the Office of University Research
Monday, September 22, 2008 -- SCAC Applications in Due in Department offices for:
-Mini-Grant for Spring 2009 through Spring 2010
-Summer Stipend for 2009
- Assigned Time for either Fall 2009 or Spring 2010
NOTE: It is suggested that Departments keep one copy of each application and forward four additional copies to the College office.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008 -- SCAC applications due in College Dean's office.
Monday, September 29, 2008 -- Reports of Work Accomplished for 2008 Summer Stipends due in the Office of University Research
Wednesday, October 15, 2008 -- All Applications and College ratings due in the Office of University Research
NOTE: USE ONLY THE UPDATED FORM BELOW. DO NOT USE PREVIOUSLY DOWNLOADED FORMS.
SCAC Application Form
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