Faculty Development Rules & Procedures for Travel Awards
1. Each College Dean will appoint a Faculty Development Travel Award Committee. The Committee will include, at a minimum, the Dean (or his/her designee) and at least one tenured faculty member who is not a department chair or assistant chair. Other Committee members are at the discretion of each College Dean.
2. Based on the number of full-time faculty in each College, an allocation of travel funds from the overall faculty development budget will be determined. The original determination of total funds from the faculty development budget dedicated to faculty travel shall be the purview of the Provost. Other allocations of the faculty development budget will include, but are not limited to, faculty research grants and on-campus workshops.
3. Each faculty member is encouraged to apply for faculty development travel funds as early as possible. Absolute deadlines for application will be set by each College Faculty Development Travel Award Committee.
4. To apply for travel awards, the faculty member must complete the official WLU Travel Request form available online (www.westliberty.edu/business-office/employee-templates-forms/) for downloading and completion. An additional page containing the following must be included with the Travel Request form. BOTH FORMS MUST BE SUBMITTED TO THE APPROPRIATE COLLEGE DEAN (OR HIS/HER DESIGNEE) BY TIMELINES ESTABLISHED BY THE TRAVEL COMMITTEE FOR CONSIDERATION.
- Name of conference/workshop
- Purpose of travel (presentation, participate in workshop, lead workshop, etc)
- Justification of travel
- Plans to extend conference/workshop experience to the WLU campus (presentation, mini-workshop, etc)
5. The original committee-approved Travel Request form must be initialed by Crystal Lorimor in the Office of the Provost prior to filing the form according to WLU Business Office established procedures for final University approval. The acknowledgement from the Office of the Provost is required before the Business Office will approve the Travel Request and serves as record that the requested amount has been encumbered from the Faculty Development travel funds. A copy of the committee-approved Travel Request form must also be filed with Crystal Lorimor in the Office of the Provost at the same time.
6. Travel must be undertaken in accordance with West Virginia state and WLU Business Office procedures (Procedure #40 under Human Resources webpage). A Travel Settlement form initialed by Crystal Lorimor in the Office of the Provost with original receipts must be filed with the WLU Business Office within 15 days of completion of travel (or as otherwise designated by the WLU Business Office). The acknowledgement by the Office of the Provost on the original Travel Settlement form serves to notify the Business Office that final travel costs have been recorded with Faculty Development. The Business Office will not process the settlement without the acknowledgement. A copy of the Travel Settlement form (no receipts) must also be filed with the College Dean (or his/her designee) and Crystal Lorimor in the Office of the Provost.
7. If the faculty member cannot fulfill an approved travel request, they must notify both the College Dean/Travel Committee and Crystal Lorimor in the Office of the Provost as soon as possible. The funds encumbered for the approved trip will be returned to the open pool of travel funds for that College.
Revised 8.15.2012/Effective Fall 2012
