Dear campus community, 

We are writing to provide a reminder of current campus travel guidelines, requirements, and resources for university-related international travel to support the health, safety and wellbeing of UC Riverside travelers. 

Trip registration is required for all university-related international travel. Registering international travel is an important risk management step to assist UCR in knowing the location of campus community members who need to access travel insurance for emergency medical care or evacuation in the case of natural disaster or political unrest. UCR students, faculty, staff, and postdocs must register their international travel, regardless of travel purpose or State Department Travel Advisory Level. University approved travel booked via ConnexUC is automatically registered. Travelers can also register their travel in UC’s travel registration system UCAway.  If the traveler is a U.S. citizen, they may also opt into registering in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP). 

• UC employees must be on approved university business that is being paid for by the university. 
• UC students must be participating in a UC sponsored and supervised off-campus activity that meets the policy definition of a "covered activity." 

Travel insurance and travel alerts are provided for university travelers. After their trip registration, UCR students, faculty, staff, and postdocs traveling on university-related business are enrolled in the UC travel insurance program and receive travel alerts from UC’s security provider, Crisis 24.   

Pre-approval may be required for riskier destinations. Travelers to U.S. State Department Level 4 (“Do Not Travel”) destinations may be required to participate in a pre-departure “Know Before You Go/Travel Preparedness Briefing” with UCR Risk Management and others as applicable. Per federal guidelines, university-related travel to comprehensively or targeted sanctioned countries is generally prohibited and requires immediate consultation with UCR Export Control and Risk Management, including Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Syria, Russia, and specific regions of Ukraine (Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk). For further details, contact risk@ucr.edu.  

Education Abroad program review: Regardless of State Department advisory level, the UCR Education Abroad office must review all education abroad programs, such as group travel and faculty-led education abroad programs, regardless of whether the program is run for credit. This includes all education abroad programs for study, internship, research, volunteer, and work abroad programs. This process ensures that education abroad programs are in compliance with risk management best practices and that programs are counted in national IIE Open Doors numbers. For further details, contact educationabroad@ucr.edu.  

It is the responsibility of the traveler and approving department to ensure the financial, health, and safety risks associated with international travel are assessed before authorizing travel.   

 

• Please review the U.S. State Department’s Travel Advisory for your destination(s) in detail and contact risk@ucr.edu with questions. Use the Worldcue Planner travel intelligence portal to research any location and obtain global travel trips. 
• Travelers and approvers are urged to avoid non-essential travel to destinations that are restricted to U.S. government personnel, cite a risk of Wrongful Detentions (indicated with a "D"), or Kidnapping (indicated with a "K”) on the State Department Travel Advisories. These may also include specific regions within level 2 and 3 destinations. They can be found at the top right corner of the country's alert page. Contact risk@ucr.edu with questions or to request a briefing. 

Travel to another country presents unique data security challenges. The nature of international travel may require that you use your devices (laptop, tablet or smartphone) in unfamiliar places that may expose your data and device to malicious people and software, and some countries do not have the same free-speech or data protection privileges as others. Carefully review the Department of State travel advisory for your destinations, including guidance related to local laws and special circumstances.  

Please refer to campus resources for international travel for guidance on U.S. export and sanctions regulations, reservations/reimbursements, travel policies, field research, risk services, and cybersecurity.  

We thank you in advance for your cooperation.