RESOLUTION: GBR-2012-2-28 Guidelines for Establishing USTCAF Named Awards and Scholarships

Resolution
GBR-2012-2-28

Title
Guidelines for Establishing USTCAF Named Awards and Scholarships

Content
Title: Guidelines for Establishing USTCAF Named Awards and Scholarships

(Note: AF is a shorthand name for USTC Alumni Foundation (USTCAF); GB stands for the governing board of USTCAF.)

1. PURPOSE AND EXPLANATION

The purpose of establishing AF named award is to accommodate the requests from donors who wish to set up award programs with specific names. This program is aimed to enhance fund raising so that AF will be able to aid more students and faculty with outstanding achievements.

In addition to the right of naming the gifts, the donors will work with GB to define the nature of the awards and the criteria for recipient(s). Each award will bear its own name and with custom-made award certificate(s). There will be a dedicated webpage for each such award on AF's website, including a brief description of the award and the chronicle records of its awardees.

This guideline does not introduce new categories of award, but rather, it sets standards, procedures and requirements of entitling a new award within the existing merit-based award and scholarship categories, and possibly with additional requirements.

All such awards will have a two-year trial period at the beginning. The new awards will continue if no objection is raised to GB by the end of the trial periods. The awards will terminate if there are no remaining balances.

2. AWARD CATEGORIES

The new award must fall into one of the existing USTCAF merit-based award categories, as determined by previous AF resolutions. At the time of drafting this guideline, there are six existing award categories:

  • High School Scholarship (HSS);
  • Outstanding New Student award (ONS);
  • Excellent New Student award (ENS);
  • Teaching Excellence Award (TEA);
  • Young Faculty Achievement Award (YFAA);
  • Young Faculty Career Award (YFCA);

Based on the selected award category, factors such as, but not limited to, grade, sex, school, and department can be added as extra requirements but such requirements shall not be exclusive such that only one person qualifies.

3. THE PROCEDURE

1). The donor informs AF about his/her intention of setting up a new AF named award. Upon receiving the request, GB shall initiate the procedure of establishing the new award.

2). Unless GB designates a different person, the current secretary will be the AF representative to handle this new award establishment. This AF representative will then contact the donor, and discuss the award criteria, including the category of the new award and the extra criteria the donor wish to add, if any.

3). After the initial discussion, a memo will be drafted, either by the donor or the AF representative, and it will then be submitted to GB for discussion. The memo should include at least the following information:

a)          the name of donor (the donor may be an individual, a group, or an institution); specify the contact person if the donor is not an individual;

b)         the proposed name of the award;

c)          the award criteria, including the award category and any other specific constraints, if any;

d)         the award amount and the number of awardees allowed annually;

e)          details supporting that the donor meet the requirement of establishing AF named award

The terms on the memo will be negotiated between the donor and the GB if necessary until a mutual agreement is reached. As deemed necessary, the AF representative may also want to contact USTC side to obtain their comments.

If no objection is raised to GB for five consecutive days after the submission of the latest version of the memo, it will be considered silent approval.

4). Once the memo is approved by the GB, a sub fund will be established for this award. All donations associated with this award (per donation pledge or written letters) will go to the sub fund.

5). Announcement regarding the new award will be published on AF’s website as a news article, and it will be included in the next AF newsletter. Dedicated web page for the award will be created when the first award is issued.

6). All related information will be properly documented and archived.

7). The candidate selection process for the new award will be the same as other awards under the same category, and they will be processed together for each academic year. After the awardees have been selected and confirmed by the GB, the award certificates will be made and mailed to USTC officials, who will then distribute them to the awardees.

4. FINANCIAL REQUIREMENT

The donor must make commitment on one of the following:

1). Meet all the criteria as follows :

  1. Make an initial donation equal or greater than sum of ten years of the newly established annual awards;
  2. Initial donation is no less than $10,000;
  3. Make the minimum annual donation(s) specified in the memo during each following year (i.e. the annual donation could be the amount needed to support one Goodwill student for one year; currently at $450 per student)

2). Or make an initial commitment over $100,000. The total committed amount may be donated in a lump sum or over a 5- to-10 year period of time.

5. BILL OF CONFLICTS

AF is the only legitimate organization in authorizing new awards for the donation. AF is entitled to make final decisions on the awards and revoke any award in case of violation of terms as outlined by this article. If there is conflict of interests, AF reserves the final rights to interpret this article. Any decisions made by GB on matters regarding to the awards are final. AF bears no legal obligations to the recipients of the awards, USTC or concerning parties.

6. EXEMPTIONS

Any exemption of the guidelines listed in this article and/or modifications concerning the awards will have to be approved by 2/3 of GB members.

Add'l info

Passed on Feb 22nd 2012. Total 7 committee members, 7 of whom cast their vote, 7 “For”, 0 “against”, 0 “abstain”

Author
YING, Linghang

Sponsors
GONG, Xiaohua; LI, Xun

Last Change
2012-02-22