Education

Users of maps and other visualizations of data want it all. They want both detail and context as they explore small scale (large area) graphics. Technologies to address this challenge have come and gone. The latest one is from researchers at Purdue. Their tool, dubbed PolyZoom, organizes simultaneous, magnified views from a single document, while maintaining their relationship to the whole.

Unlike the board game, the Map of Life lives online and as its name suggests, maps out life on earth. To be more specific, it provides location information for a selection of living things on earth.

In a well-shared article from May 7, the Atlantic Cities explores the work of Bruce Appleyard, who studied children’s mental maps (cognitive mapping a la Kevin Lynch) of their neighborhoods. The unfortunate headline is “Kids Who Get Driven Everywhere Don't Know Where They're Going.” Sadly, that's not what the uncited research, from 2005, concludes.

On Monday of this week, Detroit Works, the agency planning the future of that city, rolled out both a game and a social network to get its citizens involved in the planning process. 

Last Friday's Chicago Sun Times article

Are you thinking about becoming a certified GIS professional? Looking to understand how it could benefit your career? Sheila Wilson, GISP, executive director of the GIS Certification Institute, and Susan White, GISP, senior planner with the city of Fort Worth’s Planning and Development Department GIS Team who currently serves on GISCI’s Review and Outreach Committees, provide the top 10 things you should know about the process.

GIS and geospatial education are hot topics in 2012 as students try to find the right path to careers and employers try to select new contributing employees. These articles, podcasts and webinars reveal the variety of topics we covered in the first quarter of this year.

Richard Quodomine, GIS coordinator at the New York State Department of Transportation, recaps the February 2012 annual meeting of the Association of American Geographers (AAG). Quodomine also serves as the vice chair of the Public/Private Affinity Group for AAG and he explains how that organization is reacting to current trends in the economy and the marketplace. He observes: "Applied geography and GIS are becoming very important."

The Department of Labor’s Geospatial Technology Competency Model (GTCM) is a milestone in the history of our field. Culminating a decade-long quest to define the U.S. geospatial industry and its workforce, the GTCM identifies the expertise that distinguishes, and binds together, successful geospatial professionals of all kinds. David DiBiase of Esri, the coordinator of the GTCM effort, lists the important facts about this endeavor, which was sanctioned by the U.S. Department of Labor.

The National Geospatial Technology Center of Excellence (GeoTech Center) is a National Science Foundation-funded program to develop educational tools for two-year colleges. Dr. Phillip Davis, the Center’s director, provides his top 10 reasons why you need to look closely at how the GeoTech Center is performing its mission.