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Yes! Please email the SRC Coordinator (uvmsrc@uvm.edu). The coordinator meets with each creative presenter to discuss each presentation's needs.

Tables, monitors, mannequins, projectors, laptops, headphones, white boards, poster boards, and easels. If you need other equipment, the coordinator will work with a presenter to help them make their presentation design happen. 

A presenter is encouraged to bring and invite their own audience. Some audience members may be there but typically rooms are populated by the presenters' friends and families.

Presentations are grouped based on research category and time slot. Sometimes presentations cannot be grouped thematically due to schedule complications. 

There is no predicting the number of people that will stop by your poster. The more engaging and legible your poster is from afar, the more people will stop and chat.

Everyone should have an elevator pitch/stump speech/brief synopsis of their research ready to go. That is the first step to success. Practicing that 1-3 minute introduction of your research for a friend or your mentor is the perfect way to hear what kinds of questions they might have.

• Many students prefer notes. Be sure to write notes that can be understood at a glance. Write in bold fonts, keep your reminders short and to the point, and make sure they help you stay on track.
• Some of us present faster with an audience and some of us go slower. Practice your presentation with your roommates, family, and/or colleagues to test out the length of your presentation.
• Use visuals, but don't expect your audience to read and listen at the same time — keep slides minimalistic and important.
• Keep your introduction and conclusion brief, to the point, and similar. You want your audience to leave feeling they've learned something and a conclusion is a good opportunity to draw them back to what they've learned.
• The bulk of your presentation should be on your key points and evidence or focused to one point in particular. Try to hone your presentation to suit your time limit, audience, and field.
• Plan for questions! Your talk is likely briefer than what you would have written in a paper, so there will always be things you had to leave out and you will be asked about those.
• Remember, the people in the audience are interested to hear what you have to say. Breathe and look at your audience — they are likely excited by your subject and want to engage. Relax and remember that you are among colleagues not judges.

Before you begin making your poster

1. Remember who your audience is. The Student Research Conference is open to the public, meaning your audience could range from complete novices to experts in your field. Keep this in mind at every step of the process.
2. The first and most crucial step is deciding the best ways to consolidate information for your presentation. Many SRC projects (by no means all of them) are semesters or years in the making; it is not possible to fit every bit of your project into one poster or the elevator pitch you should have ready for presentation day. Consolidation can be done in many ways, the three most common ways are: Focusing on Methodology, Demonstrating the Relevance and Importance of this research, or Talking about the Outcomes or Findings (this is not possible for all projects as they stand by the presentation date - one need not have findings to present).

Designing your poster

1. Design some visuals. Graphics come in all forms, maps, graphs, charts (numbers and/or words), images (microscopic, landscape, or otherwise), etc. Your information should be dynamic to draw a viewer in, and act as a jumping off point for the questions and conversations that develop with a viewer. Graphics can make the time a viewer reads before asking questions shrink and allow you to actually explain the images to the viewer. 
2. Map it out. Below are the key ingredients for every great poster.
   • You will want to edit the abstract you already have or create a new one. Having an abstract gives the viewer a place to start. Once you have your abstract ready, you'll be able to beginning mapping the path you would like a viewer's eye to take when they are looking at your poster.
   • Make sure you give credit where it is due. You should thank any sponsors or collaborators of your project or posters (incl. funding sources, your colleagues in your lab or field who assisted, and of course, your faculty mentor).
   • Include a work cited portion. You needn't cite every work that is in the bibliography for your project, but you should have anything on your poster credited as well as a hard copy of your bibliography on site in case you need to cite something in speech.
3. Picking your poster creation platform is the next big step. Many students use PowerPoint, but those more confident in design or who prefer not to use PowerPoint often opt for graphic design tools like Canva or Adobe products. Whatever way you make your poster, keep in mind the optimal dimensions for the poster board that is provided is 24"x36". If your poster is going to be larger than that, please contact the coordinator of the conference to make possible accommodation for a larger posterboard.
4. Edit. Edit. Edit. It cannot be expressed enough the importance of taking a critical eye to all of your work but especially your presentation. Edit critically for spelling and for text length. Fewer than 800 words is best. Consider your poster as a jumping off point or a visual aide, not the presentation itself.
   If you're unsure whether your poster is too busy or unclear, show it to a friend and time how long it takes them to read it. Imagine that same time with a stranger staring at your poster, while you wait to answer questions If it takes too long, it may feel awkward—or worse, they might lose interest entirely. Consider:

• Fonts:
  • Can what you would like to be seen be seen from 4-feet-away? Most viewers will not come closer until they have a question.
  • Are your fonts complementary? Changing fonts can be helpful for highlighting information but often we take it too far, be sure your poster is not too chaotic.
  • For best viewing and reading, make fonts size 44 or larger.
• Colors:
  • Posters are visual! Use color, size, and layout to provide direction and emphasis. See ¶¶Òõ̽̽'s Creative Narrative & Graphic Elements for tips.
  • Be wary of background color and dark colors: colors will appear darker on your poster than they do on your computer.
• Audience:
  • People learn differently from you, are you catering to only those that think like you?
  • What background information does a viewer need to understand your poster and is that asking too much?
  • Are there ways you could dial down the jargon and make it relatable? Einstein said, "If you cannot explain it to a six year-old you don't know it well enough."
  • Think of the message you are trying to get across as well as the audience who attend the event. The audience is likely to be someone interested in research but not necessarily familiar with your field.
  • People most often survey posters — interested people then read them. Have enough information for both kinds of viewer.
• Images:
  • Use high-quality images: when expanded to poster size they will lose some quality. Zoom in to 400% to get a sense of what your image will look like when printed.

Printing your poster

We recommend printing your poster through the ¶¶Òõ̽̽ Print & Mail Center. The typical size for the Student Research Conference is 24"x36". 

Presentation Tips

When talking about your poster, have ready a 1-sentence introduction and a 2-5 minute description of your research, the "elevator pitch." Expect questions. The audience is likely interested and will want to know more.