Promoting Education and
   Research in Clinical and Translational
Science across the Career Pipeline

Institutional Research Training Grants at the University of Pittsburgh

Tips for Preparing Budgets

Stipends

The first category listed will be for yearly stipends for predoctoral trainees, and the next category will be for yearly stipends for postdoctoral trainees.

It is important to refer to current stipend rates posted on the NIH NRSA site to determine the dollar amount to list in the predoctoral, postdoctoral, and other stipend categories.

Tuition and Fees

The NIH currently reimburses tuition up to $16,000 (or $21,000 for MD/PhD trainees).

Because of the rising costs of tuition, fees, and health insurance, the NIH temporarily limited support for these costs for FY 2006 competing applications for NRSA institutional training grant support (NOT-OD-05-059). You may request the estimated full costs in your proposal budget, but you will need to provide a detailed breakdown of the costs so the grants management staff can do the calculations when they make an award. For your tuition request, estimate the number of resident versus nonresident trainees you expect to appoint and estimate the number of predoctoral trainees prior to the dissertation stage versus in the dissertation stage you expect to appoint. Keep in mind that few graduate students are considered trainee residents for tuition purposes and that tuition remission does not apply to students appointed as trainees. As you project escalation for future years, remember that tuition costs have generally increased more rapidly (e.g., 6%–10%) than other categories of costs. In some cases, it may be best to weight your proposal to postdoctoral fellows at 75% or more of the budgeted slots.

NOTE: A common error is to underestimate tuition costs based on the mix of students, the anticipated tuition rates/number of credits, or calculation errors. Because there is already an NIH-capped amount in this category, we encourage you to carefully consider your projected tuition costs (based on the number of credits and residency status) at the time of the proposal. Before beginning a proposal that involves predoctoral candidates in the schools of the health sciences, you are strongly encouraged to consider it with Drs. Arthur Levine and Michael Lotze.

Training-Related Expenses

This category provides funds to help defray the costs of associated expenses, including staff salaries, equipment and supplies, and health insurance for the trainees. The following table is taken from NIH NOT-OD-05-059 and shows the new way to budget training-related expenses. The NIH will reimburse up to $4,200 for predocs and $7,850 for postdocs for training-related expenses, including health insurance.

For University of Pittsburgh tuition rates, fees, and insurance for budgeting training grant slots, please contact the Office of Institutional Research.

Trainee Travel

Refer to the specific NIH agency for policies on funds provided in this category. In most cases, there will be a predetermined amount per trainee that may be requested in the range of $400–$1,000 per trainee.

Facilities and Administrative (F & A) Costs

Facilities and administrative costs (also called indirect costs or overhead) should be requested at a rate of 8% of total direct costs minus the tuition, fees, and equipment.

The following table summarizes differences between the old policy and the new policy.

The Institute for Clinical Research Education serves as the Research Education and
Career Development Core of the Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI)

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