Final Project¶
The final project is a self-directed spatial analysis of an engineering problem your team chooses, carried through the same standard the labs use: a framed question, documented data, a reproducible model, a validated result, a professional map, and a stated set of limitations. The Week 12 page walks through how to pick a problem, how big it should be, and how it is scored.
Deliverables and when they are due¶
Weeks are course weeks; see the Schedule for how they map to the calendar.
| Step | What | When |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Proposal | Meet with the instructor as a team to discuss your idea, the data you need, where you will get it, and the analysis you plan. Some class time is set aside for this; otherwise book a slot at calendly.com/dan-ames/office-hours. Then record your team, idea, and data on the class Google document. | Week 14, by Friday 5:00 pm |
| 2. Presentation | An eight-minute video (YouTube or similar). Post its link on the class Google document. | Week 15, Wednesday 11:59 pm |
| 3. Lab assignment | Write your project up as a lab assignment modeled on Lab 4 — Cell Phone Tower Placement, with all the same sections including the results, so that a future student could do it. Submit it as a Word document on Learning Suite. Each team member submits separately. | Week 15, Thursday 11:59 pm |
| Presentation notes | Watch at least ten classmates' presentation videos and turn in what you learned that was new or interesting. | Week 15, Thursday 11:59 pm |
With your lab assignment, add three notes:
- What percentage of the total project you personally did (in a two-person team the ideal is 50 percent; say 25 or 75 if that is closer to the truth).
- Your best guess at the hours you personally spent.
- Whether you think this project would be a good one for future students to try.
Presentation videos¶
There are no live presentations. Each team records an eight-minute video and posts its link on the class Google document by Wednesday of Week 15. There is no class in Week 15: use the week to finish the project, then watch at least ten classmates' videos and turn in your notes by Thursday.
Past projects¶
Prior-year projects are the best guide to what a finished project looks like. Presentation decks from past years and example write-ups (parks, trip planners, sledding hills, fire paths, earthquake risk, reservoir siting, culverts, Mars craters, and more) are linked from the Week 12 schedule page on Learning Suite.
Note
Using AI on the final project. Use AI freely across the whole workflow — scoping the question, evaluating data sources, troubleshooting the processing, and writing — and add one line to your report saying what you used it for. Do not take a field name, an expression, a coordinate system, or a number from it, and do not present generated output as a result you produced in ArcGIS Pro. See the AI Use Policy for the full policy.