Intellectual Property Policy

Responsible Unit: Office of the Provost | Executive lead: Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost
Created: 02/02/2024 | Reviewed/Revised: <dates> | Effective: 12/10/2024
Compliance:  N/A
Approving Body: PAC/BOT | Classification: Institution-wide, BOT 

Policy:
The creation and dissemination of knowledge is a fundamental part of the mission of the Pacific Northwest University of Health Sciences (PNWU).  Scholarly contributions of the university enrich our common knowledge and promote the spirit of innovation.  Intellectual creations often hold potential to enrich the greater academic community or society at large.  In order to encourage the continued creation and dissemination of intellectual capital, PNWU affords its creators certain rights to the use of their intellectual property.  These rights are intended to protect the creators of intellectual property, while recognizing the support of PNWU in the creative process.

This  Policy deals with the relative rights and responsibilities among PNWU students, faculty, staff, administrators, and the university, regarding intellectual property rights in works authored, created, invented, discovered, or developed by students, faculty, staff, administrators, alone or in cooperation with, or with the assistance of others, regardless of whether those others be students or employees of PNWU, or external to PNWU.

Patents:
A patent prevents anyone else from duplicating, using, distributing, or selling your invention without permission. Patentable inventions include a new invention, process, method, device, product, or unique new way to use existing ones.  An Inventor may lose their right to patent the invention by certain disclosures made thereof prior to filing a patent application and/or if the invention has been in public use or offered for sale in the United States.  This policy applies to all inventions, conceived or brought to practice, while using university support such as stimulus/incentive funds, equipment, facilities, supplies, technology, or services.  This policy covers three types of inventions:

  1. Jointly-Sponsored: Inventions that were developed with support from an entity external to PNWU (i.e., research grant, contract, memorandum of agreement [MOA], memorandum of understanding [MOU]).  These inventions will be disposed of in terms of the applicable agreement or obligation to the external entity.
  2. University-Sponsored: Inventions that were developed with the support of the university and do not involve any external support, contract, MOA, or MOU.  These inventions will be the property of PNWU, except where the university and the inventor establish shared ownership.
  3. Unsponsored: Inventions that were developed without any support from PNWU and where the university does not have any obligation to an external entity with regard to the invention.  These inventions will be the property of the inventor or the property of the inventor and any entity with which the inventor has a personal contract/agreement.

Any invention covered under this policy must be disclosed to the Provost and Chief Academic Officer by means of the Invention Disclosure Form (IDF). Within 90 days of disclosure, the university or its designate will make an evaluation and decide whether to apply for a patent or not.

When PNWU owns partial or full rights to an invention, the university will share the proceeds from the patent with the inventor(s).  The inventor(s) will receive a net royalty to be distributed as follows:

  • If the PNWU net royalty is between $0.00 – $100,000, 50% of the royalty will be given to the inventor(s) and 50% retained by the university.
  • If the PNWU net royalty is between $100,001 and $200,000, 45% of the royalty will be given to the inventor(s) and 55% retained by PNWU.
  • If the PNWU net royalty is over $200,000, 40% of the royalty will be given to the inventor(s) and 60% retained by PNWU.

Net royalties are defined as the total proceeds the university receives from selling or use of the invention minus expenses incurred by the university for patent fees, litigation costs, consulting fees, reproduction costs, and any costs related to marketing and sale of the intellectual property.  Forty percent of the university’s net royalties will be deposited into a restricted account within the sponsoring College or School, which the Dean or Program Director will use to support research development.

Copyright:
Copyright is the ownership and control of an intellectual property that is an original work being subject to United States copyright law (U.S.C. Title 17).  Any PNWU employee or student, who creates a copyrightable work, holds all rights in copyright, except for the following cases.

  1. The copyrightable material is classified as a work-for-hire by PNWU. A work-for-hire is work performed by an employee within the scope of their employment at the university.  PNWU will own all rights in a work-for-hire product unless the university has relinquished them in writing.  Traditional Works of Scholarship and Instructional Works belong to the faculty and do not fall under the work-for-hire definition, except under the following conditions:
    1. Any didactic material created by a PNWU employee (e.g., course syllabi, lecture notes, PowerPoint presentations, lab manuals, assessments, audio/video recordings) that is not published under contract with a commercial publisher is property of both PNWU and the employee/creator.
    2. Any didactic material created by an employee that is posted on the PNWU learning management system (LMS) is property of both PNWU and the employee/creator.
    3. Any didactic material that meets the criteria in 1.a or 1.b may not be sold for profit or used by a for-profit organization without the written consent of both PNWU and the employee/creator. However, the employee/creator has the right to use the created work(s) at another educational institution if they leave the employment of PNWU.
  2. The copyrightable material is classified as a university sponsored or commissioned project. University sponsored/commissioned projects are those projects for which PNWU has provided exceptional support to an employee or student to perform a specific work outside their normal scope of employment or coursework.  Student work performed as required in a course syllabi or as a degree requirement are not considered sponsored/commissioned.
  3. The copyrightable material is classified as a third-party contract. A third-party contract is a project where PNWU enters into an agreement or contract with an external partner who funds the work, either in full or part.  PNWU employees or students perform the contracted work, and the disposition of the copyright is governed by the agreement with the external third party.
  4. The copyrightable material is classified as a mutual-agreement project. A mutual-agreement project is a project where PNWU enters into a unique agreement with an employee or student that is different from a work-for-hire or a university sponsored/commissioned work.

 

Ownership:
Ownership for any patentable invention or copyrightable work must be agreed upon as soon as reasonable during the creative process.  Ownership may be determined any time before, during, or after the creative process.  However, no royalties or other profits can be dispersed or credited to anyone until a financial profit agreement has been signed by all those who have right to ownership of the invention or copyrightable work.  If no financial profit agreement exists, payment of royalties or other profits will be decided at the discretion of an arbitrator or civil court, as appropriate.

Works Containing Material Generated by Artificial Intelligence (AI):
The United States Copyright Office can only protect creative works that are the product of human creativity (Copyright Registration Guidance: Works Containing Material Generated by Artificial Intelligence.  16190 Federal Register, Vol 88, No. 51, Rules and Regulations 37 CFR Part 202, 03/16/2023. https://copyright.gov/ai/ai_policy_guidance.pdf).  A computer/machine (or artificial intelligence) can only be used to assist a human in the creative process, not generate the material solely in response to human prompts.  If a work’s traditional elements of authorship were produced by a non-human, the work lacks human authorship and cannot be copyrighted.  If a human arranges AI-generated material in a creative way such that the entire work constitutes an original work of authorship, the work can be copyrighted.  However, in such cases, copyright will only protect the human-authored aspects of the work which are independent of the AI-generated material itself.  As an example, it would be legal for two human authors to use the identical AI-generated material to create two completely different copyrightable works.

Trademarks and Service Marks:  PNWU is the owner of, and legally responsible for, all trademarks and service marks created by PNWU employees within the scope of their employment.  Employee or student use of PNWU trademarks or service marks without permission is prohibited.  The PNWU Intellectual Property Committee (IPC) reviews and grants permission to use PNWU trademarks or service marks in the creation of intellectual property.  The IPC also determines the claim to any mark ownership if extramural funding was involved in the development of the proposed mark.

Student Works:  PNWU and its employees who wish to market, reproduce, distribute, or otherwise re-use works in which a student holds sole ownership must obtain permission from the student owner prior to such use.

Mixed Contributions: Occasionally, intellectual property is created under conditions where the contributions of individual entities are not clearly identifiable, where contributions to the project span beyond the time a contributing student or employee is associated with the university, where there is no external partner with rights to the intellectual property, or where the end product is very different from the original creator(s) intended.  In such cases, the university will assume all ownership rights to the intellectual property.  If doubt arises as to who has rights of ownership, the PNWU Intellectual Property Committee (IPC) will determine ownership rights.

Use of Intellectual Property:
The use of intellectual property is restricted to their respective patent and copyright laws, which define the intellectual property ownership.  The use of patented or copyrighted intellectual property for the purpose of promoting commercial interests or personal interests is prohibited, except where all owners of the patent or copyright agree on its use.  This includes using patented or copyrighted materials in social media to promote disparage one’s personal or commercial interests.

 

Reassignment or Waiver of Rights:
Any party may reassign or waive their patent rights or copyright to another party or to the university.  Reassignment or waiver of rights often facilitates the commercial development or marketing of the creative work.  Rights may be reassigned or waived wholly or in part.  In these cases, the university accepts the responsibilities and rewards associated with these assets.  However, the university does not automatically assume any liability associated with receiving any patent or copyright.

 

Release of Rights by the University:
PNWU may decide to relinquish its patent rights or copyright ownership to the creator of any intellectual property, or to a third party, if this will benefit the parties concerned.

 

Appeals:
Any creator who wishes to request an exception to this policy, or to challenge an intellectual property decision of the university, may submit a written appeal to the Provost and Chief Academic Officer.  Upon completion of the appeals process, the decision of the Provost and Chief Academic Officer will be final.

 

Definitions:
Copyright – a government license that gives the creator of an original work, or another right holder, the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work for a limited period of time.

Exceptional Support – financial or other support for creative activities beyond that which a student or university employee would reasonably presume to receive during the course of employment or degree completion.

Employee – any person who is receiving compensation in exchange for work or service to PNWU (excluding independent contractors are operating as a separate business partner and/or pay their employees to complete the contracted work).  Part-time PNWU employees, no matter how small their full time equivalent, are bound by this policy.

Financial Profit Agreement – a legal document that outlines an arrangement between two or more parties where they agree to share financial profits generated from a product or service.

Instructional Works – any copyrightable work that is authored by a university employee for the instruction of students in a traditional, online, or hybrid course of instruction.  Examples of instructional works include course syllabi, lecture notes, lecture slides, multimedia aids, laboratory manuals, electronic teaching aids, and other works integral to the pedagogy of a specific university curricula.

Intellectual Property – a work, creation, or invention of the intellect for which one has rights of ownership and may apply for patent, copyright, or trademark.

Invention Disclosure Form – a confidential document written by the creator of intellectual property to determine whether patent protection should be sought for an invention.

Patent – a government license that gives the owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, copying, or selling an invention for a specific time period in exchange for disclosure of the invention.

PNWU Service Mark – a legally registered name or designation used like a trademark to distinguish the university’s services from those of its competitors.

PNWU Trademark – unique symbols or words used to identify and represent the university.

Student – any person who is enrolled in an academic program at PNWU, including anyone who is on probationary status or between academic terms (semesters).

Traditional Works of Scholarship – any copyrightable work, other than patentable intellectual property or work subject to exceptional support from the university.  Examples of traditional works of scholarship include journal articles, books, book chapters, research bulletins, monographs, scholarly presentations, and non-patentable software.

 

Procedure:
Intellectual Property Invention Disclosure

 

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