The Esri Innovation Program (EIP) encourages educators and students to advance geospatial science in research and education, aligned to industry trends and workforce needs. The program aims to cultivate growth in GIS research and promote teaching excellence in spatial data science, analytics, and GIScience in higher education institutions. EIP institutions and their students gain technical expertise, resources, and support provided by Esri and a community of peers.

Yale was selected to join the Esri Innovation Program (formerly Esri Development Center) in August 2018. 

As part of the EIP membership, Esri offers the opportunity for the member institutions to organize a campus-wide competition to select the EIP Student of the Year during the spring semester. Since the 2019-2020 academic year, the Yale Library's GIS Support Services have organized a nomination-based Yale's EIP Student of the Year competition.