The GPSA Council debated Saturday how to distribute nearly $92,000 at its disposal for graduate research this year.
The council already had about $24,000 budgeted for the Student Research Allocation Committee, but was told by the Student Government Accounting Office that it had access to more funding for research through the graduate student government's endowment.
Martin Tong, senior accountant of the Student Government Accounting Office, presented a breakdown of GPSA's budget and told the group that this was the first time its endowment, which has an estimated value of $184,000, had reached a level where the graduate student government could withdraw from the interest it had accrued.
"Your bylaws state that you really couldn't touch it to this point, but the amount we see available for research allocation is now $23,522," Tong said.
Student Activities Director Debbie Morris said she thought this was the first time the endowment had reached a level where it was accessible.
"This is really great news for you," she told the council. "In order to spend it, you need both council and Provost Brian Foster's approval, but I'm sure he'll go with whatever the council approves. It gives you a lot more freedom."
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The issue was revisited during committee reports when Laura Boykin, the Student Research Allocation Committee's chairwoman, said she received 80 research applications, with committee members from a variety of fields prepared to vote on them. She recommended that the surplus available from the endowment be distributed through her committee.
"I think it would be a lot easier to set it up this way rather than establishing a whole new set of rules and wasting time," she said.
Another council member objected, saying that it would be better to wait and apply the funding to the spring process.
Council Chairman Bill Dials disagreed.
"That would just be settling for mediocrity and lowest common denominator," he said. "Why shouldn't we reward the people who applied in the fall? It's only fair. Besides, the money is distributed in the fall and spring, and we don't reward bad applications."
Several council members then said that many people in the humanities fields don't bother to apply for student research funds because they think that those funds only go to grants related to biology, anthropology and other sciences.
"That's a really unfair misconception that we need to have cleared up because no one reads applications from their own departments," Boykin said. "It's art history, education and music people funding the biology and anthropology applications."
The council then turned its attention to the Graduate Research and Development Fund, which was awarded to GPSA two years ago by the Legislature with the understanding that the research it funded would put an emphasis on helping state agencies.
Keith Valles, chairman of the committee, submitted a report to the council outlining his plans to allocate $44,000 as early as December.
Valles said the committee will spend $33,000 on high priority and general project research grants, which are projects that involve state agencies and individually will be funded up to $5,000 per proposal. He said another $11,000 would go to general research grants, which don't involve state agencies but are still eligible for funding and will be funded up to $2,500 per project.
"I am still working out the guidelines and this committee has a lot of work ahead of it, but I am pleased we have been able to do this much so quickly," he said. "We want to award some of these by December because it takes a lot of work to set up projects with state agencies and we figure students should know by December what they will be able to do in the spring. We think it's the fairest way to do it."
GPSA President Rachel Jenks emphasized the importance of making it clear that the research funding mechanisms through GPSA were open to all graduate students.
"It's really important that people understand that these grants are for everyone," she said. "We have a lot of great opportunities here, and we want to make sure everyone knows we are handling this responsibly.
