Introduction to GIS

Date and Time

January 30, 2026
01:00PM - 03:00PM EST

Location

1737 Cambridge St. Cambridge, MA. CGIS Knafel Building. Room SB-12 in the sub-basement.
Take the elevator to the sub-basement level.

Click here to view a Video Recording of the lectures for this workshop.

Download Workshop Materials

This two hour workshop introduces what Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are and what they are useful for. Specifically, this workshop will: 1) Describe geographic file types and data formats, 2) Explain how geographic data is used within a GIS for visualization and analysis, and 3) Introduce various use cases for GIS.  Students will use the desktop GIS software QGIS, and the web GIS software ArcGIS Online to perform various GIS tasks.

We recommend this workshop (either attending in person, or following the video recording linked to above) as a pre-requisite to all workshops that are taught for someone who is new to using GIS.

This workshop is free for Harvard affiliates with a valid Harvard ID, and is $100 for others.

How to Apply:

On these forms, make sure to choose Introduction to GIS as the workshop name.