Attention Graduate Students

The Western International Forest Disease Work Conference is pleased to offer travel awards for graduate students interested in attending the conference. The intent of the WIFDWC Student Travel Award is to enable more students to attend WIFDWC meetings and to assist with broadening their professional experiences via networking with professionals. The award is intended to assist with conference-related expenses. All students who receive Travel Awards are required to participate in the Student Flash n’ Dash Session and are expected to present more details on their work either in a poster or as a contributed paper during the “Special Papers” panel.

Application process:

Graduate Student Introductions and Presentations:

We request all graduate student attendees to do a brief introduction (“Flash and Dash” <5 minutes) of you and your research program. Students should contact Brad Lalande  (bradley.lalande@usda.gov) for more information on the Flash and Dash format and expectations. This will take place on the morning of Tuesday May 12th. This is a great opportunity to share your research at the beginning of the conference!

Graduate Student Awardees and Special Papers, Poster Session, and Other Panels

Graduate student travel awardees are encouraged to give an oral presentation (PhD students) or a poster presentation (MS students) in addition to the short research update in the Student Flash n’ Dash session. Once awardees have been notified of their award, PhD students not already presenting on another panel should contact Brennan Ferguson (Brennan.ferguson@usda.gov) with a presentation title for the ‘Special Papers’ section and MS students not already presenting on another panel should submit poster titles to Patrick Bennett (Patrick.bennett@usda.gov), the poster section moderator