Alfred P. Sloan Foundation -
Pre-Tenure Leave Fellowship Program

Purpose:

Sloan Pre-Tenure Leave Fellowships will provide funding to regular, untenured, tenure-track faculty at selected institutions faced with urgent family responsibilities so that they could take a leave with salary or, after a leave, resume research. Such leave could be taken either by choice, such as during a normal pregnancy or following child-birth, or in response to an unexpected crisis requiring special care of a family member.

The full announcement and description of this award may be found on the Foundation's website at:  http://www.sloan.org/programs/edu_pretenure.shtml

Eligibility:

Selected university or college:

Selected universities and colleges in the United States have been and will continue to be invited to apply to participate in this program. To qualify as a participant in this program, an invited institution or one of its major academic units, such as a School of Engineering, would have to:

• provide a statement for why it wants to participate in the program;
• agree to match funding that would be provided through a Sloan Pre-Tenure Leave Fellowship. If the University provides paid leave for reasons related to child-bearing or dependent care, this salary could count toward the match. Otherwise, to count toward the match, the salary, benefit or in-kind contribution would have to be in addition to anything that would be automatically provided;
• have in place policies that allow part- or full-time leave and stopping of the tenure clock for faculty requesting such leave for reasons related to child-bearing or dependent care;
• if such policies have not been newly created, describe the record of promotion, obtaining tenure and receiving research grants for faculty taking advantage of them;
• describe an explicit (although not necessarily elaborate) administrative safeguard that would ensure -- or at least render highly unlikely -- that faculty who take advantage of leave options would not be evaluated inappropriately and inadvertently jeopardize their career;
• agree to keep complete and systematic records on what happens to faculty who take a leave as a result of urgent family responsibilities and indicate to us who will have the responsibility for collecting and maintaining these records;
• present a plan to disseminate the existence of Sloan Pre-Tenure Leave Fellowships among all relevant faculty and to invite these faculty to participate; and
• agree to consider revising current family leave policies and practices, in light of experience with the Sloan Pre-Tenure Leave Fellowship Program, with the objective of ensuring that family- related leave, taken either by choice or by necessity, may be taken without jeopardizing a faculty member's career. Qualification to participate would initially be for three years and would then be subject to re-evaluation before continuing.

Faculty:

Once an invited institution or unit within such an institution qualifies to participate in the program, any faculty member in the fields of mathematics, science, engineering or technology in that institution or unit would be eligible to apply. (For purposes of this program, "science" covers natural sciences, including agricultural science and biomedical science, but not medicine, dentistry, veterinary medicine, public health or social sciences, including psychology. Faculty in health-related professional schools who are engaged in non-clinical basic biomedical research are eligible.)

Amount of Award:

The amount of the Fellowship would be up to $40,000, with equal amounts of up to $20,000 provided by the Sloan Foundation and the faculty member's home institution. The Fellowship money and matching funds could be used for either or a combination of the following:

• to take a full- or part-time paid leave for reasons related to child-bearing or dependent care. Funds might be used, for example, for research costs (such as graduate student support, travel to professional meetings, or equipment costs ), or to cushion the economic impact during the period of the leave, or both; or
• to facilitate career reentry for faculty who have taken a full or partial leave for reasons related to child-bearing or dependent care. Funds might be used, for example, to restart a research program, fund a graduate assistant, purchase equipment or supplies, pay for child care, or buy out a course.

In addition, $5000 would be offered to the faculty member's department to be used to address work-family issues for other faculty, post-doctoral fellows, or graduate students. This might be used, for example, to bring in speakers or convene meetings or for small grants to assist other faculty, post-doctoral fellows or graduate students.

Selection Criteria:

Fellowships will be awarded on a competitive basis to faculty from institutions that have been invited to participate and have qualified. Applications from faculty whose department Chairs have credibly certified are making good progress toward meeting the department's standards for tenure would be judged solely on the extent to which receiving a Sloan Pre-Tenure Leave Fellowship is likely to contribute to the retention and career success of the applicant. Application for a Fellowship would normally precede the faculty member's taking a leave and applicants are requested to apply with as much leadtime as possible in their particular circumstances. However, because family-related leaves cannot always be planned in advance, submission after the leave has begun would be acceptable in instances when an application could not have been submitted in advance.

Application Process:

All applications would have to come through the faculty member's department. To be considered, the application must include a certification from the department Chair that the applicant has been making good progress to date toward meeting the department's standards for tenure, has the support of the department in the leave and/or subsequent re-entry plan, and will receive the institutional support indicated in the application. The Chair must also indicate the source of the matching funds and roughly how the $5000, potentially available as a Department grant, would be used. Matching funds coming directly from the department would be taken as a strong sign of departmental support.

Applicants would be required to provide a statement explaining how their family responsibilities conflict with their professional advancement, the exact conditions related to child-bearing or dependent care that prompts or prompted the desired full- or part-time leave, and whether the fellowship is being sought to facilitate the taking of a leave or career reentry following a leave or both. Applicants would also be required to make a specific request for financial support and provide a budget for use of the Sloan Pre-Tenure Leave Fellowship and of the institutional matching funds.

NOTE:  The Office of Grants and Contracts (107 Seeley G. Mudd Building, DUMC / Telephone: 684-5175) must review all applications prior to submission to the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

The Foundation's activities do not normally extend to religion, the creative or performing arts, elementary or secondary education, medical research or health care, the humanities or to activities outside the United States. Grants are not made for endowments or for buildings or equipment.

The Foundation has no deadlines or standard forms. Concise, well-organized proposals are preferred. In no case should the body of the proposal exceed 20 double-spaced pages. The Foundation accepts proposals sent by e-mail. A brief letter of inquiry, rather than a fully developed proposal, is an advisable first step for an applicant, conserving his or her time and allowing for a preliminary response regarding the possibility of support. Some proposals may be asked to include plans to develop and continually update a web-site concerning the project.

For more information or to submit a proposal, please contact:

Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
630 Fifth Avenue
Suite 2550
New York, NY 10111
Tel: 212-649-1649
Fax: 212-757-5117

External Deadline for Application:

Rolling.  Grant requests can be made at any time for support of activities related to Foundation program areas and interests. The Foundation is generally limited to supporting tax-exempt institutions.

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