4S administers travel funds to support the participation of students and other low-income scholars in its annual meetings. Three sources of funding are used for this purpose. The first two sources are exclusively available to support graduate student travel. They include the National Science Foundation-supported funding, and a special fund created from proceeds from the 2010 meeting. This Tokyo Fund supports Asian, African, and Latin American graduate students who have a paper accepted to present at the 4S meetings. The third source of funding comes from the additional revenue generated from sustaining members and is used to support meeting participation by both students and other low-income scholars.
Awards are available for travel expenses only, not for food or lodging. However, applicants who receive grants will also receive complimentary conference registration. The amount of each award will be determined once all applications have been received. In previous years, individual awards were in the range of $150-400, but can be up to $1000 in some circumstances, subject to the total amount of 4S travel funds available.
Note that the limited funds available do not allow us to award travel grants to all applicants. The funding decision will be based on the following criteria:
Applications open after acceptance notices are sent.
To qualify for a travel award, an applicant must be a student or other low-income scholar presenting a paper at the 4S Annual Meeting and a member of 4S. In cases of co-authorship, no more than one award will be granted for each paper presented.
Applicants can expect to hear the outcome in time to make the early registration deadline. If announcements run late, we will extend the early registration deadline for applicants upon request.
Reimbursements are distributed after the meeting. Save your receipts to submit via the reimbursement form.
The application deadline for 2019 has passed.
For graduate students receiving support from the base funding, because funds for these awards are provided by the U.S. National Science Foundation, 4S must comply with U.S. federal rules for reimbursable travel. The awardee is responsible for following the terms specified in NSF document 761, Travel to Foreign Countries. In particular, see Article 13, sections C and D of that document. By submitting the application form the applicant agrees to abide by these terms. Reimbursement will not be provided unless these terms are followed.
Note that all air travel must occur on a U.S. carrier or in a U.S. airline designated seat on a foreign airline. Original receipts carrying the airline’s designator code and flight number must be provided (if you have an e-ticket, you must get a receipt at the time of check-in). Under certain circumstances, described in the NSF guidelines, travel on a foreign carrier may be allowed. Documentation of the unsuitability of U.S. carrier itineraries is required.
The mileage reimbursement rate for use of a privately owned vehicle is 56.5 cents per mile, per U.S. Internal Revenue Service guidelines. Receipts for gas must be provided!
For more information, please contact Prof. Paige Miller. In the subject line, put 4S Travel Grant Application: [name].