Terminating F30 early - consequences?

[Fruit Strength]

Hi all,
I'm currently a G1 in the process of applying for an F30 and am requesting 4 years of total funding (2 years of graduate school funding and 2 years for M3/M4). If I happen to finish my PhD earlier than expected (say using only 1 or 1.5 years of the requested 2 year graduate school funding) - would I be able to end the graduate school portion of the F30 early and go back to M3/4 without any consequences or would I be obligated to stay for the full requested time of graduate school funding? Any insight would be much appreciated!

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[PumpernickelCloudberry]

You should ask for the most amount of money you can get (so two years of PhD and two years of MD). Any extras at the end is returned to NIH. Ask the MD/PhD administration or your PhD department grant office to help you with this

 

[Fruit Strength]

You should ask for the most amount of money you can get (so two years of PhD and two years of MD). Any extras at the end is returned to NIH. Ask the MD/PhD administration or your PhD department grant office to help you with this

Thanks for the reply! My PhD department grant office suggested the same thing but I am their first F30 grant submission so wanted to make sure I wasn't going to get black-listed or have the M3/4 funding cut short if I finish the grad school portion of the proposal early.

@Fencer do you happen to have any experience with students requesting more years than they actually took for the graduate portion of the F30? Were they able to keep the funding after returning to M3/4? Any insight would be much appreciated!

 

[eteshoe]

FYI I would almost never bank on finishing your PhD earlier than expected

 

[Fencer]

My trainees have had about twenty NRSA grants over the past decade. Rules are enforced differently among institutes. In general, you request more, but it is ok to do less years. They like to have 2 years of research and 2 years of medical school. I have seen every permutation (3+1, 3+2, 4+2, 4+1, and even 1+2), but the rule requires at least one entire full year of research. Make sure that you do the appropriate budgeting for the SOM years (higher tuition). You will be fine if you finish your PhD sooner than you expect.

 

[aaugh]

FYI my understanding was you can only request as many medical school years as graduate school years, i.e. 50% of the award has to be toward PhD. I had to resubmit and so requested 1+2 but was asked to revise to 1+1 following the NOA. If you graduate early you would likely be requested to give an equivalent amount back from MS3/4 years. Either way like everyone else has suggested I doubt NIH will be angry for getting money back.

PS depending on how your institution distributes the allowance, consider the fact that you will lose a year of allowance during MS3/4 if graduating early. That money can come in clutch for study resources and step registration. My administrator is currently policing my allowance for step 2 registration because I will register within funding period but likely take the outside right outside the funding period.

 

[Fencer]

Indeed... That is the rule, but I have seen someone do 15 months of research (proposed as 2.25 years) but due to fortunate circumstances (throw experiment dice and got lucky) complete sooner than expected with preservation of funding during the SOM years.

 

[Fruit Strength]

FYI my understanding was you can only request as many medical school years as graduate school years, i.e. 50% of the award has to be toward PhD. I had to resubmit and so requested 1+2 but was asked to revise to 1+1 following the NOA. If you graduate early you would likely be requested to give an equivalent amount back from MS3/4 years. Either way like everyone else has suggested I doubt NIH will be angry for getting money back.

PS depending on how your institution distributes the allowance, consider the fact that you will lose a year of allowance during MS3/4 if graduating early. That money can come in clutch for study resources and step registration. My administrator is currently policing my allowance for step 2 registration because I will register within funding period but likely take the outside right outside the funding period.

Thanks for the comment. Yeah on the F30 PA page for my intended institute it says that at least 50% of the time must be spent in graduate school so I may end up having to revise to 1+1 like you (if I end up getting funded lol). I just hope my MSTP will not be upset if I ask to return F30 money to NIH and for the program to cover M4...

 

[Fruit Strength]

My trainees have had about twenty NRSA grants over the past decade. Rules are enforced differently among institutes. In general, you request more, but it is ok to do less years. They like to have 2 years of research and 2 years of medical school. I have seen every permutation (3+1, 3+2, 4+2, 4+1, and even 1+2), but the rule requires at least one entire full year of research. Make sure that you do the appropriate budgeting for the SOM years (higher tuition). You will be fine if you finish your PhD sooner than you expect.

Thanks a lot for the comment Fencer! That's a good point about the budgeting differences for M3/4. Hopefully my MSTP program director will not be too upset if I end up having to return F30 money to NIH for M4 and requesting the program cover my stipend instead. I'm hoping that finishing the PhD early will be enough justification for returning money.

 

[Fencer]

They won't be too unhappy... after all, you will be improving their MSTPs' time to dual-degree, which is a core measure for the NIH T32 MSTP award. Even if they didn't have the T32 as of yet, the statistics are followed for 10 years for new MSTPs or 15 years for old MSTPs.