Section 21-21I-5 - Minority doctoral assistance contracts and terms.
21-21I-5. Minority doctoral assistance contracts and terms.
A. A minority doctoral assistance grant shall be evidenced by a contract between the student and the sponsoring institution.
B. The contract shall:
(1) provide for the payment to the student by the sponsoring institution of no more than twenty-five thousand dollars ($25,000) per year for no more than four years;
(2) be conditioned upon the student's earning a doctoral degree in the field of engineering, physical or life sciences, mathematics or any other academic discipline in which ethnic minorities and women are demonstrably underrepresented;
(3) require the student to agree to begin to teach in a faculty position at the sponsoring institution within five years of completion of the doctoral degree; and
(4) require the student to teach in a faculty position at the sponsoring institution for a minimum of one year for each year a minority doctoral assistance grant was awarded.
C. Grants to students who fail to complete the terms of their contract shall be considered loans with an applied annual interest rate equal to the treasury note rate in existence at the time the contract is entered into plus two percent. The loan shall become due in equal parts to the state and the sponsoring institution immediately upon the student's termination of the contractual agreement.
D. The general form of the contract shall be approved by the attorney general and signed by the student and an authorized representative of the sponsoring institution. The sponsoring institution is vested with full and complete authority and power to sue in its own name for any balance due it and the state from any student violating the terms of any such contract.
E. The commission shall approve all minority doctoral assistance contracts entered into between students and sponsoring institutions.