Participating in Summer Salary Program

Summer salary is additional compensation paid to eligible CUNY faculty members who perform research on sponsor funded awards outside of the nine month academic year. Summer salary is paid in addition to the faculty member’s academic year annual salary rate and the corresponding work must be performed during CUNY’s summer semester (June 1 – August 24). A sponsor may limit the summer salary period. To receive summer salary compensation, faculty and/or grants officers must create and submit an appointment and payment authorization in RFCUNY’s Summer Salary system.

Once the summer period has fully passed, a principal investigator (PI) must certify the submitted effort of those with summer salary activity on their account. Faculty and/or grants officers are responsible for calculating the summer salary allowance, creating an appointment in RFCUNY’s Summer Salary electronic system, and completing payment authorization.

Only Full-time teaching CUNY instructional staff under the following titles are eligible to participate in the Summer Salary Program:

• Professor
• Associate Professor
• Assistant Professor
• Lecturer
• Lecturer (Doctoral Schedule)
• Instructor
• Instructor II
• Einstein Professor
• Distinguished Professor
• Distinguished Lecturer
• Substitute Assistant, Associate or Professor
• Law School Assistant, Associate or Professor
• Medical (Basic or Clinical) Assistant, Associate or Professor

CUNY instructional staff in the following series are not eligible to participate in the program:

• Executive Compensation Plan Series
• Administrative Designated titles (REM) series
• HEO series
• CLT series
• Adjunct series
• Non-teaching Adjunct series

Calculating Summer Salary Allowance

The maximum allowance is calculated based upon the Full-time academic year annual salary:

Annual Salary/9 = Monthly Allowable Summer Salary Base

Salary for participation in scholarly research shall not exceed three-ninths of the faculty member’s academic year annual salary. National Science Foundation grants allow only two-ninths for summer salary, even in cases where scholarly research is conducted. Training grants allow two and one-half ninths for summer salary.

Creating an Appointment

An appointment may be created and approved by a PI or authorized signatory (AS) on the account in question or the Grants Officer (GO) of the college of the account. If a PI/AS creates an appointment, a GO must approve the request before RFCUNY provides final approval. Upon full approval, the appointment amount is encumbered on the submitted sponsored account. The appointment is entered as a one-time lump sum amount per employee per account.

Completing Payment Authorization

After RFCUNY has approved an appointment, a PI or GO must return to the Summer Salary system to complete payment authorization. Divide the encumbrance total over the number of summer pay periods the CUNY Instructional staff will work and “save” this information. There are six “Pay Periods” covering the entire summer period (June 1-15, 16-30, July 1-15, 16-31 and August 1-15, 16-24). As the time periods open, these “saved” amounts must be approved by the campus GO. RFCUNY will forward the details of the fully approved payment authorizations to the University payroll. CUNY’s payroll office is responsible for approving and executing the payment.