In addition to hunting down overwhelming loads of required textbooks and materials, students face the challenge of locating all their classes with the start of each semester. This semester, more than 100 UW-Madison students are utilizing the recently launched iPhone app Campus Maps to make finding spring classes fast and easy.
University of Maryland computer science graduate Vikram Bhandari first released Campus Maps in the summer of 2011 from his college dorm room. Equipped with high-resolution imagery maps and simple search capabilities, the mobile app caters to more than 100,000 students across 100 different campuses.
Bhandari discovered the need for Campus Maps during his time at the University of Maryland, where he experienced the struggle of receiving a semester schedule packed with confusing shortened versions of class and location names.
“I got my schedule with all these abbreviations and was like, MTH, okay, that’s math. What threw me off was the acronym for the building: ASY,” Bhandari said. “I had to find the campus map, which only came in PDF format and didn’t even list the acronyms. I decided then that I needed to make a [map] that would actually help.”
Bhandari said Campus Maps has many advantages over smartphones’ pre-downloaded navigation apps and the mobile Google Maps app. His app allows users to search for campus buildings with both keywords and acronyms and is faster than any similar app. From booting up Campus Maps to finding the exact location and image of any given campus building, Bhandari said the whole process only takes about seven seconds.
He ensured Campus Maps is more accurate than its competitors. Names and addresses found in Google Maps are often misspelled, according to Bhandari, who said he keeps his app up to date by making it easy for consumers to contact him and personally responding to every email he receives.
Looking to the future, Bhandari plans to further develop Campus Maps and provide coverage for more colleges and universities across the country.
“[The app] went from [covering] one school to 100 schools. Next year, it’ll be, like, 500 schools,” Bhandari said.
He has additional plans to make information on nearby job openings and reviews of local businesses accessible in Campus Maps.
“Freshman year, you’re just trying to get around. Sophomore year you’re going to want a job. Junior year you’re going to want an internship. Let me help you find that,” Bhandari said. “Campus Maps is meant to be an app people love that puts students first.”
UW-Madison iPhone users can download the app for free from the iOS App Store.
