Researchers involved with such projects must each get their fair share of the credit for efforts towards achieving the goals of the project. Likewise, the academic units that participate should each receive their fair share of any returns of Finance and Administration (F&A) (overhead) funds that are returned to the units.

The purpose of this Policy is to establish a protocol for agreement on intellectual and financial contributions to interdisciplinary projects. The procedure will also serve as the basis for distribution of any F&A funds to academic units participating in the project.

Each proposal involving researchers from outside the researcher's home academic unit will clearly indicate on the "Sponsored Programs Application Approval Sheet" ("Blue Sheet"), the agreed-upon division of F&A costs among the participating units. This will show up for each academic unit on the "Facilities & Administration Return" line of the Blue Sheet. The figures on this line for each unit will, in most cases, be consistent with those shown as the total "% Effort" for the Co-Investigators in each unit and "Intellectual (reporting) credit (%)" lines for each unit. Notice that the Intellectual Credit and F&A Return lines are for academic units, not for individual researchers.

In some cases, the percentage figures for Intellectual Credit and for F&A Return may not be consistent with one another because of special project considerations relating to operation of special facilities or equipment by one of the performing units. Such exceptions should be briefly documented as an attachment to the Blue Sheet.

In some cases, F&A costs are not paid by the funding agency. In these instances, intellectual credit should still be identified to indicate the relative contributions of time from the cooperating units.