This guide will help you discover and access geospatial data for use in research and course projects. It is meant to help you get started and features information about common public and licensed sources of geospatial data rather than being an exhaustive list of resources.

For more advanced help finding geospatial data resources, please contact Josh Sadvari (Geospatial Information Librarian) at sadvari.1@osu.edu.

If you are looking for more information about physical and digital map collections at University Libraries and beyond, please visit the Maps Subject Guide.

This tutorial is intended to help researchers and students frame a search strategy based on their project or assignment objectives and perform a search for geospatial data (in this case, using the Big Ten Academic Alliance Geoportal).

For instructors who may wish to incorporate this information into their course to support student projects, there are two supplemental activity worksheets provided at the links below:

• Activity 1: Framing Your Search
• Activity 2: Searching the BTAA Geoportal

This tutorial is part of an educational series produced by members of the Big Ten Academic Alliance Geoportal. To access additional tutorials in this series that cover various other topics, visit: https://sites.google.com/umn.edu/btaa-gdp/tutorials.