Introduction

Poster competitions allow presenters to showcase their work to a broader audience, such as campus stakeholders, community partners, and corporate sponsors. 


Presenters can vary widely:

  • Undergraduate student researchers as part of a summer or honors program
  • Graduate students sharing capstone or thesis presentations
  • Interdisciplinary teams showcasing their final outcomes
  • Faculty members highlighting findings to initiate corporate or community partnerships


Challenges

  • Different disciplines prefer abstracts and presentations in different formats (e.g., traditional poster vs. demonstration or performance).
  • Mentor or supervisors may need to approve posters, especially for undergraduates.
  • Poster presentations may need to be judged or evaluated, with awards for top projects.
  • Once information is collected, content may need to be shared widely and publicly.


Solutions

  • Collect basic project or presentation information initially on the Requirements page, including the presenter's preferred format.
  • Gather mentor information from the presenter directly using Applicant-Driven Routing Steps. 
  • Build other routing steps for judges or any others that need to provide feedback.
  • Utilize the Engagement Hub integration to showcase presenters and their materials publicly.


Tips

  • Standard posters can be collected as file uploads (PDF is best to retain formatting issues. Instruct presenters to convert PowerPoint slides to PDF for the best results).
  • Audio or video submissions should first be uploaded to an external site (e.g., YouTube, Zoom, Vimeo). Then use a text field to instruct presenters to paste the link on the submission form. They should make sure their link is public before submitting.
  • Judging rubrics are best made with the Comments & Ratings Routing Step. Use different rating scale ranges to mirror point values (e.g., If criterion "Appearance" is out of 20 points, rating scale should be 1-20).
  • Use award and reject notifications to share judges' feedback and help presenters learn.
  • Utilize an automated import from the main InfoReady platform to the Hub to seamlessly create a mobile-friendly conference navigation site for your attendees. Contact your account manager or support@inforeadycorp.com for more information on this process.

Have more questions about this topic? Go to the Community Forum to pose the question to other users or submit a support ticket to InfoReady.