Student Essay Contest Finalist The future of surveying has arrived. New technologies have been introduced and old ones have advanced. With the advent of mobile internet access, public interest in mapping has increased. The last decade has not only transformed our capabilities, but also our expectations. As a geomatics student preparing to graduate from The...

Student Essay Contest Finalist Every time there is a project, surveyors are the first to enter and the last to leave the project site. It is our duty, basically, to gather information and provide it.  That information is needed to build, locate, or define something. The moment I started thinking about the future of surveying,...

Student Essay Contest Finalist Land surveying is the process by which land is surveyed and measured using mathematical means. The history of land surveying dates back thousands of years. Technology has come a long way since the Jacob staff, and the working man knows there are different tools used to accomplish certain jobs in the...

Student Essay Contest Finalist A couple of years ago, shortly after I made the decision to pursue a career in surveying, a man whom I have come to have great respect and admiration for told me something that I remember most every day.  He told me that if you put 20 surveyors together in a...

This “Future of Surveying” essay by contest runner-up Michael Nadeau, PLS/CFedS, comes from the perspective of a non-traditional surveying student. With 18 years of experience, having been a past chair for the Utah Society of Professional Surveyors and having taught surveying classes himself, Michael has gone back to school to complete his four-year surveying degree...