USGIF has awarded more than $1.6M in scholarships since launching the program in 2004.

Sponsored scholarships come with a minimum 3-year commitment of at least $10,000 annually. USGIF works with the awarding organization to tailor the scope of the scholarship to meet the goals of the organization and the needs of the GEOINT community. USGIF awards general scholarships to graduating high school seniors, undergraduates, graduates, and doctoral students. Sponsoring organizations can choose to focus on any or all of those groups, as well as on a specific area of GEOINT or a social factor like diversity or socioeconomic status if they so choose. The sponsoring organization may also appoint one person the USGIF scholarship selection committee.

Through pledging a scholarship, sponsoring organizations demonstrate their commitment to the future of GEOINT’s workforce and tradecraft. There are often also practical outcomes to donating to USGIF’s scholarship program. RGi was so impressed with the 2020 recipient of the RGi Scholarship for Geospatial and Engineering that they hired her to join the company as a Geospatial Programmer. Funding a USGIF scholarship connects organizations with the top up-and-coming GEOINT talent.

USGIF attracts hundreds of applications from high-caliber doctoral, graduate, undergraduate, and graduating high school senior students across the country and world through direct outreach to geospatial and related academic departments at most universities, promotion within USGIF-accredited GEOINT programs, and online marketing. Since launching its scholarship program in 2004, USGIF has built a well-connected network of hundreds of scholarship alumni who spread the word and help maintain USGIF’s status as the top geospatial scholarship organization.