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Outridge, who works at the Natural Resources campus on Booth Street, was a network investigator for ArcticNet and had participated in six of its previous conferences.

But the afternoon before the conference was to begin, Outridge was informed by his superiors that his attendance had not been approved, even though ArcticNet had paid his registration fees and there was no cost to the department.

Outridge immediately provided additional information, saying he had been asked to be part of a panel discussion, judge a poster competition and participate in an impact assessment meeting.

But his supervisors were unmoved, the tribunal reports in its decision, released Thursday. Though Natural Resources had approved the attendance of nine other employees at the conference, Outridge’s rationale for attending was inadequate, they told the tribunal.

In the end, Outridge was allowed to attend but had to use four days of personal vacation time to do so.

In his decision, tribunal adjudicator Michael McNamara said he compared Outridge’s 2010 application to attend the conference to one he submitted in 2008 that was approved and also reviewed the rationales presented by the other 10 departmental applicants.

Outridge’s reasons for attending, McNamara concluded, “are at least as reasonable and his application properly justified his attendance.”

Outridge’s employer supported his work supervising the PhD student, he noted. “It should follow that the student’s presentation should be attended by his supervisor.”