Thank you for your comments on skills vs. degrees. I have been writing code for, and teaching GIS skills, for more than 30 years. My interest, as an epidemiologist, has been with the distribution of disease in time and space. I published my first article on the distribution of disease based on socio-economic mapping for the CDC in 1972. I wrote my own code for mapping disease in Corpus Christi in 1981, and used it until "ATLAS" was marketed in 1983. When State Health Commissioner in the late 80's I required my agency to use mapping techniques to teach the public about the spread of disease.

I learned my skills the hard way. I found that while a degree tells me what skill someone should have learned it does not define their abilities. Many of my better staff never had any degree except a BS but had earned certificates of competency at various skills, including mapping, and were able to demonstrate the skills. I also note that the personnel evaluations (required) area complete waste of time and for the most part maintain the incompetent. This lack of trust in senior supervisors by the personnel managers is drive much of the rush to degrees. I would prefer certificates of skill for many special fields rather than degrees. I must admit that as a field gets increasingly complex degrees might be valuable for this who want to teach rather than practice. I do not believe it takes more than six months to learn geospatial skills with the 2-3 major software packages used. The issue really is a systematic way of demonstrating skills, this should not be very difficult with GIS.

CMG Buttery MB BS MPH
Professor of Public Health
Dept. of Epidemiology & Community Health
School of Medicine
Virginia Commonwealth University