Thinking about launching a citizen science project? Whether you’re mapping urban wildlife, collecting community stories, or tracking environmental change, CitSci gives you the tools to make it happen. This guide will walk you through setting up your project, designing your datasheet, and making smart choices about privacy and participation—no tech background needed.

Table of Contents:

1. Step One: Creating Your Project
2. Step Two: Once You Publish Your Project, Set Up Your First Datasheet (Reminder: You Can Have Multiple Datasheets Per Project!)

Step One: Creating Your Project

1. Make an account: Go to CitSci.org and make an account
2. Create your project: Then, click “Create a Project”

3. Add your graphics: Now you’re on the most important page! Let’s unpack it, piece by piece, starting with the banner and the logo. Upload an eye-catching image for the banner, and then some sort of logo that corresponds with your organization (or a different picture, if you’re an individual). 

4. Fill out the project information: This next part is pretty self-explanatory. However, we do recommend that you choose the project name with care, because that shapes the permanent project URL that you’ll give out to participants. Everything else in this section, you can edit later.

5. Decide on membership and privacy settings: Now it’s time to start being thoughtful, especially about membership and privacy. 

For membership, you can choose whether project membership is open—allowing any CitSci user to join without approval—or member-based, where project managers approve requests or send invitations. Use the open option for public participation, and the member-based option if participants need training or data must be vetted.

For privacy, you can choose whether your project data are public (visible to all) or private (only visible to members). For example, you may choose to make your project private if participants are uploading sensitive data, like how their homes are impacted by climate change (this could get them in trouble with landlords, etc.). Stuck on this part? Email admin@citsci.org, and we’ll give you some advice. 

With CitSci’s new layered privacy options, you can start small: make only certain questions on your datasheet private, then the entire datasheet if needed, and finally the whole project—if absolutely necessary. This lets you be thoughtful about data transparency while still protecting your participants. 

⚠️ Important: There are some unique privacy considerations at CitSci for projects, datasheets, and questions. Check out our decision tree, below for some insights.

At this stage in the process, you’re choosing whether to make your whole project private or not. You can get the datasheet or question-level privacy later.

6. Ignore the integrations: don’t worry about integrations or hub affiliations, at this phase in the process! You can edit those after your project is published. The integrations are mainly to help you recruit more participants with our external partners, and hub affiliations allow you to associate your project with other similar projects run by an umbrella organization.

7. Select your project headquarters: For location, we recommend you just put your project headquarters. You can be more specific in the project description (above) if the project can be done from anywhere, or only in a certain state/region, etc.

Step Two: Once You Publish Your Project, Set Up Your First Datasheet (Reminder: You Can Have Multiple Datasheets Per Project!)

1. Navigate to your project page: On the main CitSci.org page, navigate to “My Projects” in the top bar, and select the project that you manage and want to create a datasheet for.

2. Go to the datasheets section: Once you’re on the project’s page (Caroline, our comms lead, is demo’ing this with her awesome project GoBituary), click “datasheets”

3. Then, click “create datasheet”

4. Fill out the basics: Now you’re on the datasheet creator page! Start by filling out the basics here, like “Name” (such as, “GoBituary” or “Nature Tracker”) and “Instructions” (such as, “Enter all the data about the trash your group picked up in one session…”).

5. Select your date format: Now pick your date format. Different people have different preferences. It basically boils down to how specific you want to be: do you just care about the day someone submitted, or do you need to know the exact second? The choice is yours.

6. Set up the location format for observations: Now it’s time to specify the location format for an observation. You can have participants enter latitude/longitude (this would be especially relevant if you expect them to use the app to submit data while they’re outside or actively making the observation), or you can provide a list of locations (for example, “Rock Creek Park in Washington DC,” etc), or both!

Latitude/Longitude (Lat/Lon): Participants enter coordinates manually or use GPS. This is great for mobile users collecting data in the field.

• Example: Leave No Trace’s #LeaveNoTrash project uses this option so volunteers can record trash sightings anywhere—no pre-defined list required. The flexibility matches the project’s open-ended, anywhere-anytime approach.

List of Locations: You provide a dropdown list of fixed locations participants can choose from. Ideal when you want consistency in site naming or you’re tracking specific places over time.

• Example: Bald Eagle Watch uses this method to monitor known nesting trees. The locations don’t change often, and new ones are added manually if needed (e.g., when a new nesting site appears).

Both: You can allow participants to either pick from your location list or enter new coordinates. This combines structure with flexibility.

• Example: GoBituary has a list of featured cemeteries that they are working with, but you can add a new cemetery with your own coordinates. 

7. Set things up so your participants can enter the same location multiple times: You may want to turn “auto-assigning locations on” at this stage. If you turn “auto-assign” on, when someone adds a new location, it’s saved for them to reuse on any datasheet—no need to re-enter it. Turn this on if you want members to share their saved locations across datasheets. Note: This only works if the datasheet shows a location list, or both list and map.

The Land Institute, a nonprofit focused on grain crops, uses this feature for their projects. It helps participants make repeat observations over time in places like their own home gardens.

8. Set observation privacy: You can control who can view observation responses after they’re submitted. Choosing “Members Only” means responses will be visible to all project members but hidden from the public. You can also choose to apply this setting to all questions. Selecting “Managers and Observer Only” makes the data visible only to project managers and the person who submitted it, and all questions in the datasheet will automatically be private. These settings apply only to new data; existing observations will keep their current privacy settings.

9. Add the datasheet fields: Now you’re done with the “Settings” tab. Navigate over to “Add.”

10. Populate your datasheet: Now it’s time to use all those different fields to drag and drop, and populate your datasheet! Use these building blocks to design your datasheet. Each type collects a specific kind of information from participants. Try to be concise; it’s not the best user experience on the app to have to read through long questions.

🔵Label: Max. characters 250

🔵Hint: Max. characters 8000

🔵Default Value: Max. characters 800

Organisms

🔵Use this when: You want participants to monitor a species, and you have multiple questions about a particular species that you want in one section. Using this “organism” field is good to do, because it helps make sure your data is in line with international taxonomic standards.

🔵Fields you’ll see:

• Section visbility: This is where you choose to make the visibility level public, members only, or even more private.
• Add or Edit Organisms: From here, you can select organisms by searching for their scientific name.

Text

🔵Use this when: You want participants to type a response in their own words.

• Single line: For short responses like names, species, or one-word answers.
• Multi-line: For longer responses like descriptions or notes.

🔵Fields You’ll See:

• Hint: Extra guidance (e.g., “Enter the full name of the species”).
• Default Value: Pre-fill the answer with a common/default response.

🔵Fields You’ll See:

• Label: This is your question. Example: “What did you see?”
• Hint: Extra guidance (e.g., “Enter the full name of the species”).
• Default Value: Pre-fill the answer with a common/default response.

🔵Min/Max characters: Set limits on how short or long the answer can be.

🔵You can make this question required, or not!

Number

🔵Use this when: You want participants to enter a number, like a count or measurement.

🔵Fields You’ll See:

• Label: This is your question. Example: “How many did you see?”
• Hint: Extra guidance (e.g., “Give your best guess”).

🔵Min/Max: Set acceptable number ranges (e.g., Min 0, Max 100 for a percentage).

🔵You can make this question required, or not!

Dropdown – Single Selection

🔵Use this when: You want participants to pick one option from a list.

🔵Fields You’ll See:

• Label and Hint
• Choices: Add as many options as you want (e.g., “Red,” “Green,” “Blue”).

🔵You can also allow replication (i.e., reuse this dropdown for multiple entries in one observation).

🔵You can make this question required, or not!

Dropdown – Multiple Selection

🔵Use this when: You want participants to pick more than one option from a list.

🔵Fields You’ll See:

• Label and Hint
• Choices: Add as many options as you want (e.g., “Red,” “Green,” “Blue”).

🔵You can also allow replication (i.e., reuse this dropdown for multiple entries in one observation).

🔵You can make this question required, or not!

Date/Time

🔵Use this when: You need to know when the observation happened.

🔵Fields You’ll See:

• Label and Hint

🔵Make the question required if the timestamp is essential.

🔵Can be set to replicate (useful for multi-part entries with the same date). Replicate is not available for participants using the mobile app.

Single Choice

🔵Use this when: You want participants to select one option, shown as buttons instead of a dropdown (good for Yes/No or quick selections).

🔵Fields You’ll See:

• Label and Hint
• Choices: Add your options.

Images

🔵Use this when: You want participants to upload photos of what they observed.

🔵Fields You’ll See:

• Label and Hint
• Validation:
• Is this required? (Yes or No)
• Maximum images: Choose how many they can upload (1–8) | Each image can be up to 10MB

Header

🔵Use this when: You want to organize your datasheet into sections. This isn’t a question—it just breaks up the form for easier navigation.

🔵Fields You’ll See:

• Label: Be descriptive. Example: “Section 1: Site Conditions”
• Hint: Add context or leave blank.

Once you have all the questions populated, click “publish,” and you’re live!

You can make more datasheets for your project anytime. 

Still have questions? Reach out to the CitSci team and we’ll help you out!