re: Kevin Cummings' post of 21 Mar

Kevin,

I administer two university grants programs at Virginia Tech. We limit
eligibility to tenure-track faculty, and are often challenged by
researchers in other categories (i.e. instructors, adjunct faculty,
research scientists, students, etc.). It's a frustration to those who
aren't eligible, but we justify it in the sense that these two particular
programs (seed money for new investigator research and travel support to
international conferences) are intended as faculty development instruments.
It's difficult to award limited resources to folks whose association with
the university may be of a limited duration. But as you point out, the work
of other applicants is worthy of support. Our programs just can't support
all comers, so arbitrary as they may appear, filters must be imposed to
apportion the limited resources.

-----------------------------------------------

Wendy Farkas
Director,  Research Opportunities Office
Virginia Tech Research & Graduate Studies
311 Burruss Hall, Blacksburg, VA 24061-0244
  Phone: (540) 231-9353  Fax: (540) 231-4384
  Email:  xxxxxx@vt.edu