At age two and a half, K.C. Kniffin knows something you might not know about the Arctic Circle: The snow there is not good for packing snowballs. He also knows how much fun it is to breeze across the tundra on a snowmobile, or “snow-nobile,” as he prefers to call it.

Not many preschoolers from the Lower 48 get to become Arctic explorers, but K.C. got his chance courtesy of Moms on the Go, a CALS fund that covers some travel and childcare expenses for researchers out in the field. In K.C.’s case, the fund covered airfare for his father, Kevin Kniffin—the husband of microbiologist Jenny Kao-Kniffin—when she was doing postdoctoral research in Barrow, Alaska with CALS soil scientist Jim Bockheim.

Kniffin provided childcare for K.C., often playing with him in the snow just a few yards from where mom was doing research. The intent of the fund is to spare families the pain of extended separation and parents the usual load of worry and guilt about leaving their children behind. Instead, families get to flourish in each other’s company in exciting (if often challenging) new surroundings.