CLIENT GUIDELINES

This free service will allow you to find talented students from top-notch universities, eager to apply their growing GIS knowledge to your real-world project. Review these best practices before you submit your project to the database and review the bids by students interested in helping you.

The success and viability of this service depends on conscientious contributions and task completion by all parties involved. When the work on your project is complete, please take the time to share feedback about your experience with UCGIS. Submitting this final feedback will be required before you will be able use the GeoProjects service again.

Know Your Own Project

This service is designed to support projects that can be completed successfully within a typical GIS graduate program. Though there is substantial variability within those programs keep in mind that students will be completing these projects within the existing constraints of their academic program. It is essential that you are able to provide detailed description of your project with clear goals, realistic deliverables, and defined time frames. Browse through all of the descriptive elements that you will need to provide with your project to check whether your project will be suitable for this collection and this service.

A Little Effort Goes a Long Way In Finding the Right Student

These steps will help you search successfully, vet candidates effectively, and find the best student match for your project:

  • You may have the opportunity to see the profiles of multiple students who are interested in working on your project. Choosing from among those students will require you to know your own project very well in order to evaluate which student may be best suited to the task. Be ready to ask the candidate students questions to help you make the decision.
  • Inform a student promptly once you decide they're not the right fit. Students can only "bid" on one project at a time, so declining an application will allow them to pursue other opportunities. If a student's "bid-of-interest" goes unanswered by you for 5 business days, it will automatically be dropped - freeing up the student to bid on other projects, but also losing your connection to that student. So don't delay! Students can also "withdraw" their bid-of-interest on your project for reasons of their own, so monitor the website regularly to keep track of messages.

Be a Thoughtful And Proactive Communicator

Clear and straightforward communication is key to success, regardless of how it's measured. Some options you may want to consider:

  • Meet regularly (via phone or video conferencing) with your student.
  • Make sure you both understand a very explicit timeline and set of expectations and deliverables.
  • Keep your timeline on track by responding promptly to requests for additional information.
  • Clearly communicate any changes that you end up needing to make about either the timeline or deliverables.