I thought this course was really well organized! Being able to follow along in ArcGIS as I watched the videos was really great and Nick Santos gives very clear and descriptive explanations.

I enjoyed the course but feel it needs a thorough review. Most of the videos included feel incomplete because they are "supplement" videos to the ArcMap videos, and talk a lot about already having covered this in the ArcMap videos. Some of the instructions on the Assignments are irrelevant because there are pieces of information (or images) missing, and the final assignment half corresponds to the Wildfires in California scenario and half corresponds to the Electoral Votes scenario, which is confusing and disappointing after having spent a fair amount of time on the course. On top of this, the discussion forum is practically useless, as few questions are asked about issues encountered and even fewer are responded to. Lastly the QGIS version of the videos is nowhere to be found, which is disappointing for those of us wanting to improve our GIS knowledge across different software.

Great course and a great into to GIS! The instructor's videos were short and informative. However, I waited far longer than I was supposed to for my software license, meaning I was unable to continue with the course for a few weeks (while paying!). I also had some issues with the peer grading. I got docked points by a classmate for missing items in my final assignment that were not, in fact, missing. The only way to amend that, it seems, is to resubmit the assignment and get two new reviewers. I didn't have time for that. Your classmates are under no obligation to follow the rubric and can tank your grade for the fun of it. I'd give this course 5 stars if not for these two problems.

Very hard, little direction for the final project. Please update final project with better, more in-depth instructions.

Zero instructor or mod support., and while the discussion offers a number of the same or similar questions, to what seems to be a common problem with the workflows, you'll have to search back through years of questions to find where the instructor or mod took the time to answer. You will then find the help needed is included in a dead link. When really after years of seeing that these problems an FAQ or total revision of the course to include solutions to those problems are not included.

I should have never paid for this course. By the time I got into the subject the refund policy was expired. Do not take pay for this course or program at all.

Course materials have expired, no help from the team, cant proceed beyond week 1 as software is not being provided

Course no longer being supported. No longer any access to software

Receiving help and feedback is nearly impossible.

There is no explanation of ArcGIS pro

This course has provided a great introduction to GIS. It was easy to follow the lectures and the assignments were really fun. In this course, although being on the introduction level, we have been provided with good explanations of how GIS works and why we, for instance, press a certain button and not another. The course has given me a better understanding of different GIS functions but also the abilty to think more independently about the logic behind these functions. I'm looking forward the next course!

This was a great introduction to a program that I knew 0 about (other than basic computer skills). I was really interested in learning the basics to GIS but it seemed daunting. Nick's 4-week Fundamentals course is done in a logical manner, that introduces you to slow building concepts. His lectures/videos were outstanding at walking you through concepts, and the end of the week assignments were incredibly beneficial in practicing what he had just taught you!

I loved this course. The course is designed amazingly, and the instructor is one of the best. Coming from a traditional mode of learning, learning in virtual mode and that too from an instructor like Nick Santos; is a blessing. I took the course for my PhD. I had no experience with GIS and this course has now enabled me to solve a handful of problems very easily. Highly recommended for professional and students.

this was a very helpful course. I have been working with ArcGIS for a few months now and find myself floundering, trying to figure out how to do what I want to do. This course gave me lots of information on how to do everyday things in ArcGIS. My big problem with this course was that it is within ArcMAPS and not in ArcGIS Pro. From what I've heard, ArcMAPS is going to been phased out and ArcGIS is the alternative. I need more info on ArcGIS.

Very well presented. Unfortunately I think the order was a bit strange. We focused on data analysis instead of basics of data generation. In an introductory course I would have liked to see a bit more what different data looks like. Vectors, rasters, etc.

Some of us live and work in countries that don't have a lot of data (I'm a South African and I work in Malaysia... California, the Karroo, and Borneo have different amounts of information available). We're not learning GIS to analyse data because we don't have much data available. We're building the data...

We spent too much time on rivers/watersheds. I get that hydrology is Nick's field but some us will work with cities, or population, or roads, planning farmlands - a bit of variety would be nice.

The data should not be available off the Coursera page - we should have to get it off the internet so we get familiar with public data resources. The websites should have the broadest data - good regardless of what country you're in.

The assignments are very easy to cheat in. The peer review even makes it easier, upload something crappy, download a better one from someone else, edit the name and upload on your account. The man i reviewed actually forgot to change the author of the map, he uploaded it as downloaded.

The certificate is too plain, it doesn't talk of the skills gained through the course or the weight of the certificate according to the student's performance. It makes the whole thing seem like a joke. First anyone can cheat their way through and secondly even if you work hard and get straight 100%s you are no different from the the average student.

The course starts strong and there are some good introductory videos and easy to follow introductions. However, as the course continues, the quality absolutely plummets--quizzes have mixed connection to lectures, concepts are rushed through with limited explanation, and the final assignment lacks sufficient scaffolding to be anything but an exercise in frustration. Datasets are provided so you can follow along, but they are in a completed form so you have to undo a lot of things to get the file to a state where you can usefully following along with the lecture. I would encourage learners to find a different course to introduce themselves to GIS.

Still waiting for my ARC GIS subscription. I requested it on Friday, 12/2/21 and received an email that same day that it would arrive in 2-4 business days. It is now Sunday, 12/12/21 and I still haven't received it yet. I would try and chat with someone, but there is now link to be found anywhere. Also, no phone number for customer services. Now I am behind a week in this first Intro to GIS course as they will not send me the link. Kent Martin kmartin@flo-analytics.com

No assistance.

is bad

Great intro to the basic of GIS! Although they are optional, I'd 100% recommend doing the assignments - they're very low-stress since the instructions tell you how to do literally every step (extremely fool-proof) so you realize by the end you've successfully used tools that may have intimidated you during the lecture. Just make sure you don't mindlessly go through them; think about why what you're doing makes sense given the goals of the task. It also makes the final assignment (much less guidance and peer graded) far more doable.

My one critique is the peer reviewed assignment structure. We are required to grade two assignments and also wait for our own assignment to be graded, but for a while only 1 was available for me to grade, and nobody was picking up my assignment even though (in the discussion forum) it looked like they were also waiting for a new assignment to be available for them to give feedback on. I had to manually post the link to my assignment in the forum for people to see it and review it (and of course I did the same for them). It should be faster and more automatic for peers to get assignments to grade. Also, from the discussion forum, it looked like there was a lot of "give me a good grade and I'll give you one" going on - may need to moderate that more or spot-check that the feedback is accurate.

Overall, I was impressed by the clear teaching and I am looking forward to the next course of the specialization.

This is one of the first classes i took, and currently my favorite. The instructor will teach you all the fundamental things. After course 1, you'll be able to do basic geoprocessing with your data. It's definitely a comprehensive and interesting course for beginners and not-beginners like me. It has a combination of videos, readings, assignments with step-by-step instructions and extra practices. In the end, i landed safely in the peer-graded addignment session. I had a fun time learning the course.

This course really opens up the field of GIS for newbies by introducing the most powerful, useful software out there - ArcGIS. Getting to know ArcGIS is the main thing in this course, but introducing ways of handling data is also covered. The lectures were short and easy to understand. It was nice to be able to go back and review things if needed.

Best GIS online course I've ever taken! Very well structured, the explanations and illustrations are well paced and very clear. I learned everything about the foundamentals of GIS and can now make an informative map independently. I highly recommend the course and can't wait to start the second one in this specialization.

The methodology applied is the greatest to start working on ArcGIS software. The course involves the main and basic knowledge you must know about GIS. The final project, which you can participate in scoring my peer's project is really cool because it gives you the opportunity to identify your own mistakes and others'.