Support for Fellowship

College of Arts & Sciences
Policy on Support for Fellowship Recipients
The College intends to support tenured or tenure-track faculty who receive nationally or internationally competitive fellowships designed to allow the recipient to dedicate themselves full-time to research, scholarship, or creative activity for an extended period of time, typically for one full academic year. Faculty who receive such awards will normally be granted an off-campus assignment for one year. Whenever possible, the College will provide a salary supplement sufficient to allow the faculty member to remain on full salary during the period of the leave, provided that all the requirements of this policy are met.
All applications for external fellowships must be endorsed by the department head and submitted to the Associate Dean for Research, using a notification form available from the College Research Office [URL], before they are submitted to the funding agency. After consulting with the Dean and the Department Head, the Associate Dean will write a memorandum specifying the College’s obligations to the applicant and to the department if the fellowship is awarded.
Important: The notification form must be submitted even if the agency accepts applications directly, without university endorsement. The application must also be approved through RAMSeS before submission to the agency so that the applicant, the department, and the College receive proper credit. If a faculty member applies for a fellowship without first taking these steps, the College will be under no obligation to support the award in any way.
With the endorsement of the department head, a salary supplement will be provided, subject to the availability of funds, with the following limitations and provisos:

Tenured faculty who are eligible for a University Research Assignment in the year for which the award is requested should apply for a Research Assignment for one year at half salary (with or without the option of a semester at full salary if the award is not granted), following procedures announced annually by the Provost.
Faculty should not generally expect to receive supplementary salary support for a fellowship more than once every three years, on average. A faculty member’s absence from campus more often than one year in three would limit his/her ability to contribute to the university’s teaching mission, to interact with colleagues, to assist with the service obligations of the faculty, and in general to return the intellectual fruits of the leave(s) to the University.
College support will normally be limited to one continuous year of leave.
Fellowships that primarily support activities other than research, scholarship, or creative work, such as Fulbright Lecture awards, will not be covered under this policy.
Although no rigid rules will be used, the College will generally provide supplemental salary funding only up to the total value of the fellowship award. Thus the amount of the fellowship should be roughly equivalent to at least one half of the recipient’s salary for the period of the leave being requested.
When the College agrees to provide significant salary support for a fellowship recipient, the department head must confirm that the lost instruction can be covered with the salary recovered from the fellowship award. This is generally the total value of the award minus 28% for benefits. If this is not possible, the Head should discuss the department’s needs with the Dean before approving the submission.
Disciplines in which research grants are generally not available will take precedence for support over disciplines in which grants can more readily be obtained. (Thus, for example, work in biology or chemistry usually will have a lower expectation for this kind of support than work in philosophy or history.)
The fellowship award should be paid to UNCG and must cover both salary and fringe benefits. If the funding agency will not permit this, then the recipient must agree to accept a partial salary from UNCG (full salary less the amount of the award) and receive the fellowship as a direct payment from the agency. In this case, it is the recipient’s responsibility to make arrangements with HRS regarding benefits coverage and to pay all necessary taxes.
A faculty member who receives support from the College under this policy accepts the obligation of returning to UNCG for a minimum of twice the length of time covered by the support.
If the fellowship is awarded, the department head will request that the recipient be given an off-campus assignment for research by submitting a memorandum to the Dean with appropriate paperwork.

Supplemental Funding for Fellowship Recipients
Faculty who apply for fellowships that will pay part or all of their academic-year salary, but that do not include funding to pay other expenses, such as travel, may apply for supplemental funding from the College. The amount of support provided cannot be guaranteed and will depend on the number of requests and on the availability of funds. Funds should be requested in a memo to the Associate Dean for Research at the time of application and must include a description of the specific activities for which supplemental funding is requested, explaining how they will advance the goals of the project. Requests may also be submitted after the fellowship is awarded, but that makes it less likely that funding will be available to support the request. All requests must be clearly linked to the goals of the project supported by the fellowship.
Applicants are expected to request support from other internal sources in addition to making a request to the College. The Associate Dean for Research will suggest appropriate sources when the fellowship application is submitted.