Responsibilities of an NSF visitor

EPSCoR Outreach funding provides financial support for outreach visits by permanent NSF staff to acquaint researchers in the EPSCoR jurisdictions with NSF priorities, programs, and policies. EPSCoR Outreach also serves to acquaint NSF staff more fully with the facilities, research activities, and investigator expertise/potential within the EPSCoR jurisdictions.

The NSF EPSCoR Office will pay the costs of outreach visits to EPSCoR jurisdictions by permanent NSF staff, (NOTE: Program Managers who are Intergovernmental Personnel Act (IPA) employees are not eligible for EPSCoR Outreach travel support.) To qualify for this funding NSF staff must travel solely for the purpose of EPSCoR Outreach; program site visits are the responsibility of the managing program and cannot be supported with EPSCoR Outreach funds.

An outreach visit may be initiated either by 1) an EPSCoR jurisdiction host (e.g., faculty member, administrator, State EPSCoR Project Director) or 2) an NSF visitor (e.g., Program Managers, Division Director, DIS FastLane staff person.) In either case, effective planning, advisedly begun at least 3 weeks in advance, is critical.

Initiating Travel Orders for the trip:

1. Preapproval from the EPSCoR Office is required. Contact Simona L. Gilbert via e-mail (sgilbert@nsf.gov) with your proposed outreach plans. Ms. Gilbert will preapprove or disapprove the trip via e-mail. If approved all correspondence from the EPSCoR Office must be included with the travel order.
2. The Directorate Coordinator must approve ALL travel orders (TO) before the TO is routed to the EPSCoR Office for approval and obligation of funds.
3. Once the trip has been concluded, a brief trip report must be submitted with the completed voucher to the Administrative Manager in the EPSCoR Office. The EPSCoR Outreach trip report format can be found under NSF Forms in MS Word on the WinStation.