A little Winter Trivia: True or False. It must be 32°F or colder for it to snow.
(answer at the end of the newsletter)
Fact: The Winter of 1779-1780 was so cold that ice was piled 20 feet high along the Delmarva Coast and stayed there until spring. The upper portion of the Chesapeake Bay and the entire Potomac River was frozen solid. People were able to walk from Annapolis to Kent Island and from Alexandria into DC.
Please join us in welcoming Andrew Garrison to the College of Humanities and Social Sciences dean’s office.
Andrew started on January 10 as Assistant Finance Director – Grants. This is a new position in the CHSS dean’s office in recognition of our tremendous growth in sponsored research and the new reconciliation requirements. Chris Chen will focus her efforts on our E&G orgs and Andrew will be the primary contact in the dean’s office for post award grant issues. Andrew and Chris will work closely together on many topics and problems, including implementation of the reconciliation requirements which affect all orgs and funds. This will allow our office to provide a new level of support, and we are very excited about that.
Andrew has a degree in Finance from University of Pittsburgh and has been working in a grants management role at UNISYS for four years. Before that, he worked for four years as a project controller for Deloitte Consulting. Andrew brings years of experience in accounting, grants, and reporting in the corporate environment and will be a great asset to the college.
Andrew can be reached at phone ext. 3-8733 and email: agarris4@gmu.edu
CHSS Winter Info Session
Please mark your calendars for our Winter Info Session to be held on Thursday, February 10 at
10:30 am in Mason Hall, Edward Meese conference room. Just in case, we planned a snow date for Wednesday, February 16.
Our format is going to be a little different this time. The official part of the info session begins at 10:30 with welcoming remarks by Dee Holisky, followed by our presentation which should end at 11:45pm. You are invited to have lunch with us at noon, catered by Jason’s Deli, and we invited Pat Sperry from OSP to field questions on reconciliation of funds. We envision an informal lunch with a discussion of any topics of interest.
Please look for your electronic invitation and let us know a) if you are attending, and b) if you are planning to join us for lunch.
Graduate Funding Allocations 2011-2012
We will soon distribute the graduate funding allocations for 2011-2012 to departments. A major change is the way tuition support will be charged to graduate teaching assistants and graduate research assistants who meet the criteria of University subsidized student health insurance (http://provost.gmu.edu/support/sghi/subgradhi_eligibility.html). No matter their residency status, in-state tuition rates will be assessed when the departments provide support to health insurance eligible students. You will see this change reflected in the new allocations going out in February. If you have any questions, please contact Matt Zingraff or Chris Chen.
FY12 Teaching Loads
We will be opening BTS for departments to enter the FY12 Teaching Load information in the Budget Tracking System (BTS) soon. The deadline for departments to complete is March 11. This information is necessary to set up the part-time budget for FY12 as well as to help track grant buyouts, faculty leaves, and teaching for other departments/colleges.
If you have changes to faculty with administrative roles and associated course reductions/stipends in FY12, please contact Leslie or Chris to update in BTS.
Federal Work Study
Please contact Shae Mensch if you plan to request additional Federal Work Study budget this year. CHSS is juggling the funds and we would like to spend all available funds for work study by year end.
Banner Routing
There has been a change in the Routing tab when submitting an EPAF in Banner. From now on Ray Carey will no longer be a valid Applier (level 90) choice in the Routing tab so, please choose Megan Kirk (mkirk4) as your Level 90 approver.
Adjunct Offer Letter Template
The Provost Office has updated the Attachment portion of the Adjunct Offer Letter. It now contains verbiage to notify adjuncts to send the required official transcript to Holly Gillcash, SACS Compliance, in the Dean's Office. This update should be added to BTS soon for any future contracts that you send out. The link on the CHSS Finance and Human Resources, Forms and Policies page will also be updated as soon as possible.
A reminder regarding Funding Change Forms.
The Budget Tracking System (BTS) contains an online version of the Funding Change Form. The online version of the FCF automatically populates information, which both saves time and reduces the possibility of data entry error. If further flexibility is needed, OSP continues to maintain and update the Excel based FCF on their website. Please consider using the online version and following the standard circulation process. The automated form can be found under the "Grants" function in BTS. Please call Andrew at 3-8733 if you have any questions.
Revised Payment Request Form
In response to user feedback and suggestions, the Payment Request form and accompanying instructions have been revised and posted in the forms section of the Fiscal Services web site http://fiscal.gmu.edu/Forms/Formstabpage.html#APforms.
The new form includes an Other category for limited non-routine transactions that are pre-approved by the Purchasing staff. More details are available in the Payment Request Instructions.
GMUF Disbursement Procedures
Do you have questions about processing reimbursements or payments out of a Foundation account? We have posted a link to the policy on our website. The policy covers use of the Foundation voucher for payment of contractors, travel reimbursements, payment to foreign nationals and more. Also listed are prohibited expenses. Please take a look.
Answer to Trivia Question:
False. It has been known to snow with temperatures in the mid 40°s. Temperatures are below 32°F up in the clouds where the snow is forming.