Faculty Professional Development Funds

To facilitate professional development, the College will budget each year an amount sufficient to allow each tenure/tenure-track faculty member $1,500, and each lecturer $750, per fiscal year to be used in the pursuit of professional development. In addition, there will be a separate fund of at least $20,000 set aside each year to fund professional development for part-time faculty. Part-time faculty may request up to $500 per year until the $20,000 budget is expended.

As noted in the HCEA-HC contract (Section 616.1), faculty may request to pool funds to facilitate larger projects. Requests of this nature must be approved by the Division Chair(s) and the CAO.

As a general guideline, faculty may use their funds for expenses related to attending a conference (including registration, travel, and lodging), professional memberships, books, journals, tuition reimbursement, training, skill development, or anything else related to their discipline, teaching, advising, technology, or their professional duties at the college that is for their professional growth. (Note that classroom supplies, materials, and equipment are not considered professional development and cannot be funded this way.)

Faculty must use their funds for activities occurring in the same fiscal year (July 1 – June 30) that the funds are allocated. Balances do not roll over fiscal year to fiscal year.

Requesting PD Funds

1. Faculty submit a completed Professional Development Fund Request Form to their Division Faculty Admin.
2. Faculty Admin verifies the faculty’s current PD fund balance on the Division PD tracker, and forwards it to the Division Chair for approval.
3. Division Chair approves or denies the request.
4. Faculty Admin returns the approved form to the Faculty and records the request in the Division’s PD tracker.

Requesting Software/Equipment

If you are interested in using your professional development funds to purchase software, equipment, or anything else related to IT, you must receive approval from IT, before submitting your Professional Development Fund Request form. If your request is not approved by IT, the college cannot pay for the expenses.

Below is an explanation of the process:

1. Submit a ticket through the IT website. (For the request type field, please use Technology Request Review and note in the request detail that you plan to use PD funds to support this purchase, if approved.)
2. Once you have received approval from IT, you can begin the PD request process. (Make sure to attach the IT approval to your PD Request form.)

Using professional development funds across fiscal years

In rare circumstances, when registration or early bird deadlines occur in the current fiscal year for a conference/training happening in the beginning of the next fiscal year, faculty may request to apply their PD funds for the forthcoming fiscal year to the expense.

*If the faculty pays this out of pocket, they cannot be reimbursed until the new fiscal year starts.

**If the amount spent exceeds the allocation the faculty receives, they will need to wait for the give back request process in the following spring to be reimbursed for the excess amount.

Requesting Give Back Funds

By a specific deadline, typically in Winter Quarter, faculty will be asked to indicate whether or not they will be using all, or a portion, of their professional development funds (if they have not already done so). After that deadline, Instruction Cabinet will review how much funding is left in the budget, and apply that remaining amount to a process called “give-backs.” The give-back process allows faculty to request additional professional development funds beyond their initial allocation. These funds can be used to fund upcoming professional development activities, or they may be used to reimburse professional development activities that have already occurred within the current fiscal year.

Give-back requests will be collected and approved by Instruction Cabinet. The process for requesting give-back funds in described below:

1. Division Chair emails a reminder for faculty to encumber any unspent professional development funds.
2. Faculty Admin records requests to encumber funds in the Division’s PD tracker.
3. Director of Instructional Planning and Budgets provides a budget summary detailing YTD spending and encumbered funds and provides a recommendation on per person max for give-back requests. Division Chairs/CAO approve per person max.
4. Division Chair emails call for give-back requests.
5. Faculty submit a completed Professional Development Fund Request Form to their Division Administrative Assistant to request give-back funds.
6. Faculty Admin saves request forms and records the request in the Division’s PD tracker.
7. Director of Instructional Planning and Budgets prepares summary of requests vs remaining budget using the data in the Division’s PD tracker.
8. Instruction Cabinet reviews and approves requests.
9. Division Chair communicates give-back approvals to faculty and Faculty Admin, and returns signed give-back request forms.
10. Faculty Admin records approved give back funds in the Division’s PD tracker.

Give-Back Timeline

Purchasing and Reimbursement Guide

Certain professional development expenses may be purchased by the Division’s Faculty Admin using a college credit card. Other purchases must be purchased by the faculty member, and then can be reimbursed by the college after an expense report is submitted in ctcLink. Expense reports must be submitted in a timely manner, especially near the end of the fiscal year.

When traveling for work-related purposes under state funding, it’s important to understand that expenses such as mileage, hotel accommodations, meals, and other incidentals will typically need to be paid out of pocket initially. Once travel is complete, an expense report needs to be submitted to recover these costs.

Please consult the Travel Office’s Faculty PD Travel and Expense Reimbursement Guide on how to complete an expense report in ctcLink to receive a reimbursement (if applicable). A signed PD approval form must be attached to the expense report before it is submitted. If you have any questions, or need any guidance, please contact Heather McBreen or your Division’s Faculty Admin.