COMMON QUESTIONS

What is a Gift?
Gifts and bequests are awards given with few or no conditions specified. Gifts may be provided to establish an endowment or to provide direct support for existing programs. Frequently, gifts are used to support developing programs for which other funding is not available. Gifts are donations to the Institution on behalf of a Faculty Member. A gift is usually restricted to research. However, it's unrestricted in terms of how the funds are spent. A gift is non-reciprocal.

What is a Grant?
A grant is a financial assistance award to the University in the name of a Principal Investigator to assist the organization in the conduct of research or other program as specified in an approved proposal.

What is a Contract?
A contract is an Award to the University in the name of a Principal Investigator to carry out a specific task for a Government Agency as described in a request for proposal (RFP), or Request for an Application (RFA), etc. Contracts are awarded to bidders submitting proposals that best meet the requirements of the announced work, within a competitive budget range.

What is a Clinical Trial?
Any investigation in human subjects intended to discover or verify the pharmacological and/or identify any adverse reactions to an investigational product(s), and/or to study absorption, distribution, metabolism, and excretion of an investigational product(s) with the object of ascertaining its safety and/or efficacy. Clinical Trials are often sponsored by Industry (ie, pharmaceutical companies).

What is a Sponsored Research Agreement?
A research study that comes specific terms and conditions not under the normal research grant or contract. One example is an agreement between a Sponsor and a PI to perform specific research functions.