Academic research and maternity

[coriolis]

Hello, this may be a bit specific to the particular situation but any advice would be appreciated!

I work at a university and am doing some research funded by an external body. The project is due to last for 2 years and started about a year ago, so approximately 12 months left to run on it. I am due to go on maternity leave in the next couple of months and so requested an extension (from the funding body) to cover the period of time when I will be on leave. This has been flat out refused by them, and they state '...we do not extend research grants for PI* maternity leave'. Could this not be considered discrimination? They go on to say that the grant may have to be closed, which would negatively impact on the outputs of this research as well as my career. And people wonder why women are under-represented in academia...

Just to point out that the University is my employer and will pay my maternity pay etc, so it isn't an issue with my direct employer, but given the pressure to bring in research funding and produce quality research this would certainly have an impact on my career.

*Principal Investigator (ie. the grant holder, which is me)

Hm...sounds odd. And quite shocking really.
Is the funding body a big official one? (Like AHRC, ESRC etc?)
Also, why an extension? Does the extension mean they have to cough up more money i.e. because they're paying monthly, or can you have a 'break' in the funding - a sort of holiday (otherwise known as maternity leave, actually, duh!). Because what you want is a pause in the work, and a moving of the deadline.

Does your university have a research office? They may be able to advise you further.

Sorry, not very helpful!

Normally PIs involvement in their research projects is only a nominal % of their working week so it could be only 1-2 days a week. Is this how it is for you coriolis?Do you have a reseasrch asisstant/fellow who could run with the project for 6 months or so, emailing you periodic reports and maybe a meeting every few months?

You can't be the only woman who has come up against this and I wonder how others have managed? I know from my own experience the PI usually hsd very little day to day involvement.

Thanks for your replies.

Yes, it is a research council funded project. The extension wouldn't require any extra expenditure on their behalf (although maybe it effects their financial reporting and that is why they are reluctant?).

mirry2 it is an early career grant. I don't really want to go into detail but there is just me and an RA on the project. I am happy that the RA can continue to work until their contract ends (which will just be for 2-3 months of my mat leave anyway) with me using Keeping in Touch days for meetings. It is more the period after that when I would need to do some additional data analysis, paper writing etc - 1 day per week for 6 months +. My main worry is that I won't be back at work when the project ends and, while I could put together a final report, I wouldn't have had the opportunity to publish or present the research findings.

I will get in touch with the research office. That's a good idea.

I did wonder if anyone else had been in this situation. I didn't realise I had to coordinate my grants with family planning to such an extent!

If you're the PI, do you have a team who are working on the research grant with you? How would this work with you on maternity leave?

Cross posted. I wonder whether their rules are intended for the situation in which the PI is overseeing 10 projects and a team of 20 researchers, and have been inappropriately applied to you?

I'm surprised that they've not allowed for this. I'm sure having applied for several ESRC/BA type grants in the past, there's some sort of wording in there which appllies to maternity leave etc. Can you ask your mentor or line manager to check and your university's research office to follow this up? It's definitely discrimination otherwise. Similarly, what if there was some emergency health issue resulting in the PI taking a leave of absence to seek health treatment? we can't account for these extraordinary circumnstances to stand in our way of applying grants/projects!

I don't think I quite understand.
I'm assuming that your salary is not being paid from the grant. And that your other academic/admin/teaching duties have not been reduced because you have a grant.

In which case I'm not sure that I understand why it matters that they won't extend.

Are my assumptions wrong?

This is very odd. I had 6 months maternity on a BBSRC grant and it was frozen, while the university paid my mat leave, then I restarted on the grant. So technically there wasn't an 'extension', as the funding body didn't pay any extra time.

If this is what you mean, you might need to spell it out to them! Also, I was only allowed 6mo - longer than that and a replacement needs to fill in.

Good luck

Bigkids that happened to me too on a grant that primarily funded my salary. They can't suspwnd the grant here because it is funding an RA who needs to be paid while the OP is on mat leave.

Sorry - there was someone else on my grant too. Only my salary bit was frozen.

Interesting!

I guess the key is whether the grant is funding the op's salary.

It sound like the grant funds all her salary. I remember a similar thing hapening in my university when the RA went on maternity leave and the PI couldn't employ anyone else as there was no extra money available. There's a loophole here methinks