Getting Your Poster Printed

Presenting Your Research Presenting Your Research

*Major updates as of August 2025. Minor updates as of July 2026. Please read carefully for new information.*

CSURF now partners with UNCW Printing Services to print posters. CSURF will cover the costs of printing for undergraduate researchers. Graduate students and faculty will need to find other funding sources to pay for their posters.

In order to have the poster paid for, students must still submit their poster to CSURF and we will coordinate the printing and payment. The process will look similar to previous years but there are some new (non-negotiable) rules in place since Printing Services is an official UNCW unit that provides official UNCW services. We will not provide reimbursements for posters printed through other mechanisms.

**If you have access to a wide-format printer (there are multiple active printers in departments scattered across UNCW), please use it to print your posters. The funds we are using to pay for printing posters are the same that we use for CSURF grants so the more we can leave for Supplies Grants and SURCA grants, the more students and research we can support. (You will also likely have a later submission deadline!)

Instructors and Event Organizers

Instructors and organizers of events that require students to get posters printed: Submit this application as soon as you know students will be submitting posters to be printed. The costs for these will be covered by the Office of High Impact Practices. It is up to HIPs how many courses they will cover each semester.

You will receive specific instructions for how posters must be formatted and submitted (these will be same as an undergraduate researcher printing a poster for a conference). These must be shared with the students to ensure posters are printed without delay.

Printing Services can handle larger jobs more easily than CSURF but printing posters is still not their main responsibility. November and April will continue to be busy times and you will want to get in the schedule early to avoid having to change deadlines for your students and schedules for your courses.

General instructions and tips for making posters can be found on the How to Make a Poster and Guidelines for Posters pages. Instructions for submitting your poster to be printed are below. We will print posters ONCE, so please read everything very carefully. Printing Services reserves the right to decline posters that do not meet the rules and guidelines described, and will likely do so at higher rates than CSURF has in the past. Alternatively, someone from Printing Services may reach out to you to make edits and it is your responsibility to be responsive to them. They get the final say. The following requirements MUST be met for your poster to be printed:

Files MUST be a print-ready PDF at 36 x 48 with no marks.
Artwork MUST have a "safety zone" of at least a half-inch border on all sides. No text or important graphics in this area.
MUST have high-resolution UNCW House logo in teal or navy prominently placed on poster. Also acceptable to have a white logo on a dark-colored background. (this should not be the CSURF logo unless CSURF has provided support/funding for the project beyond printing the poster. Your research mentor can provide one an appropriate house logo for you)

All submitted posters must be “Printer Ready”. This means all proof-reading must be done and approvals received from your mentors and co-authors before the file is submitted. We will not make changes or corrections to poster files. Do not submit "placeholder" posters just to meet a deadline.

Posters sent by email will not be printed.

We reserve the right to decline posters from those who repeatedly abuse the system.

How to Submit a Poster to be Printed

Printing for a UNCW Course or Event

Students: You should have received instructions for how to submit your poster from your instructor or event organizer. If they have not provided you with this information, please ask them coordinate with Dr. Liu (liuk@uncw.edu).

Faculty/Staff: If you are assigning posters in your classes or organizing an event and need posters printed and those costs covered, you must fill out this application and get approval from CSURF and/or HIPs. Once approved we will provide a due date and instructions for submission.

Printing for an Off-Campus Event

**Please read carefully before proceeding**

All posters must be converted to a PDF (see instructions here) and named with LastName_UNCWUserName at the beginning of the file name (note: your username is the beginning of your email address, NOT your 850 number). For example, “Jones_tnj2394 ShowcasePoster.pdf”. This is how we know how to contact you if there are problems or when your poster is done. Incorrectly naming your poster may cause delays in communications. We are not responsible if you submit a ppt file and your poster does not convert correctly in the printing process. You will need to get it reprinted elsewhere.

To submit a poster for printing, upload the pdf of your poster to the appropriate folder below. Click on the blue "+ Create or Upload" button in the top left corner and then click on "Files upload". You will not be able to edit the filename so name it correctly before uploading it.

CSURF is partnering with Printing Services to have posters printed. Each Monday CSURF will send that week's folder to Printing Services where they will add the posters to their queue. Posters can be printed at any point during that week. Thus, if you need your poster on October 29, you should submit to the Week of October 20 folder, not the Week of October 27 folder. Speed of printing depends on if Printing Services needs additional time for edits, staffing, their other print jobs, speed of delivery, etc.

Plan accordingly, as posters sent by email will NOT be printed. You will receive an email when your poster is ready to be picked up. Pickup will continue to be in King Hall.

Note that printing is not available every week.

Week of Sept 08; due Sept 7 1159pm

Week of Sept 14; Due Sept 13 1159pm

Week of Sept 21; due Sept 20 1159pm

Week of Sept 28; due Sept 27 1159pm

Week of Oct 05; due Oct 4 1159pm

Week of Oct 12; due Oct 11 1159pm

Week of Oct 19; due Oct 18 1159pm

Week of Nov 09; due Nov 8 1159pm

Week of Nov 16; due Nov 15 1159pm

Week of Nov 30; Due Nov 29 1159pm

Troubleshooting Submitting Posters

If you upload the wrong file and OneDrive won’t let you delete it, there are many options to resolve the problem:

You can override the file by uploading a new file with exactly the same name.
Move it to the Do Not Print folder and then upload the correct file into the original folder. If you get an error about authorization privileges, calmly email Dr. Liu with the file name you would like her to delete.
If the only problem is an incorrect filename, calmly email Dr. Liu with the current file name and what the new file name should be.

Do not leave multiple files in the main folder. This can result in significant delays or the incorrect poster being printed, which wastes time, energy, and resources.

There should be only one poster per file. If a file has more than one poster, we will simply not print anything.

Reminder: We will print posters ONCE.

If you are presenting the same work at two events relatively close together, please save your poster and reuse it at subsequent events.