The Fifth Annual Los Angeles Geospatial Summit will take place at the Japanese American National Museum on Feb. 27, 9 a.m. – 6 p.m. The event will feature addresses and discussions from leading innovators in the world of geographic information science (GIS) and technology. The summit also will feature presentations from students representing more than a dozen different Southern California colleges and universities.
Registration is available here. A detailed program breakdown can be found here.
“At the USC Spatial Sciences Institute, we collaborate with a cross-cutting array of researchers, businesses, non-profits, NGOs, and other entities from a wide range of disciplines and industries to analyze, model, and visualize location-based data,” said John P. Wilson, USC Spatial Sciences Institute and summit program committee member. “Although there are many geospatial conferences across the country and around the world, our summit has the distinctive mission to connect current leaders in the spatial sciences with students from numerous different academic institutions who are the next generation of innovators.”
At the summit, students will be able to learn about emerging trends in geospatial science, technology, and applications; present papers and posters about their own research; network with industry professionals; and introduce themselves to geospatial company representatives at the closing Industry and job fair.
Industry professionals will have the opportunity to learn what leaders in their field see as emerging geospatial trends, create greater awareness for their company by sharing materials at the industry fair, network with other geospatial professionals, and have a chance to influence what academic programs are teaching to the next generation of GIS professionals.
Plenary speakers will be Gil Elbaz, CEO, Factual Inc., presenting “Location-Based Data and GIS: Changing the Future;” Keith Masback, CEO, United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation; and Chris Mattmann, Ph.D., chief architect, Instrument and Data Systems Section, presenting the case study “Data Science from the Trenches: NASA, Academia, and Open Source Trial by Fire.”
Moderators and panelists for the day’s panel discussions and concurrent presentations will include:
Estella M. Geraghty, M.D., Chief Medical Officer and Health Solutions, Esri
Chris B. Dunbar, Principal Director, Guidance & Control Subdivision, The Aerospace Corporation
Mark Sarojak, Vice President, PIXIA Corp.
Bingcai Zhang, Technical Fellow, BAE Systems
Robert Fassett, M.D., Director, Care Delivery Transformation, PricewaterhouseCoopers
David DiBiase, Team Lead – Education Industry, Esri
Isaiah Mack, Manager, California Surveying and Drafting Supply, Inc.
Thomas A. Horan, Professor and Dean, Claremont Graduate University
Myles G. Cockburn, Associate Professor of Preventive Medicine and Spatial Sciences, USC
Andre Doumitt, CEO, Digital Adopxion
R. Maxwell Baber, Director of Academic Programs, United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation
The summit is sponsored by California Surveying and Drafting Supply, California Geographic Information Association, Esri, PIXIA Corporation, United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation, and the USC Spatial Sciences Institute.
The Fifth Annual Los Angeles Geospatial Summit will take place at the Japanese American National Museum on Feb. 27, 9 a.m. – 6 p.m. The event will feature addresses and discussions from leading innovators in the world of geographic information science (GIS) and technology. The summit also will feature presentations from students representing more than a dozen different Southern California colleges and universities.
Registration is available here. A detailed program breakdown can be found here.
“At the USC Spatial Sciences Institute, we collaborate with a cross-cutting array of researchers, businesses, non-profits, NGOs, and other entities from a wide range of disciplines and industries to analyze, model, and visualize location-based data,” said John P. Wilson, USC Spatial Sciences Institute and summit program committee member. “Although there are many geospatial conferences across the country and around the world, our summit has the distinctive mission to connect current leaders in the spatial sciences with students from numerous different academic institutions who are the next generation of innovators.”
At the summit, students will be able to learn about emerging trends in geospatial science, technology, and applications; present papers and posters about their own research; network with industry professionals; and introduce themselves to geospatial company representatives at the closing Industry and job fair.
Industry professionals will have the opportunity to learn what leaders in their field see as emerging geospatial trends, create greater awareness for their company by sharing materials at the industry fair, network with other geospatial professionals, and have a chance to influence what academic programs are teaching to the next generation of GIS professionals.
Plenary speakers will be Gil Elbaz, CEO, Factual Inc., presenting “Location-Based Data and GIS: Changing the Future;” Keith Masback, CEO, United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation; and Chris Mattmann, Ph.D., chief architect, Instrument and Data Systems Section, presenting the case study “Data Science from the Trenches: NASA, Academia, and Open Source Trial by Fire.”
Moderators and panelists for the day’s panel discussions and concurrent presentations will include:
Estella M. Geraghty, M.D., Chief Medical Officer and Health Solutions, Esri
Chris B. Dunbar, Principal Director, Guidance & Control Subdivision, The Aerospace Corporation
Mark Sarojak, Vice President, PIXIA Corp.
Bingcai Zhang, Technical Fellow, BAE Systems
Robert Fassett, M.D., Director, Care Delivery Transformation, PricewaterhouseCoopers
David DiBiase, Team Lead – Education Industry, Esri
Isaiah Mack, Manager, California Surveying and Drafting Supply, Inc.
Thomas A. Horan, Professor and Dean, Claremont Graduate University
Myles G. Cockburn, Associate Professor of Preventive Medicine and Spatial Sciences, USC
Andre Doumitt, CEO, Digital Adopxion
R. Maxwell Baber, Director of Academic Programs, United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation
The summit is sponsored by California Surveying and Drafting Supply, California Geographic Information Association, Esri, PIXIA Corporation, United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation, and the USC Spatial Sciences Institute.
Two weeks ago, CNN had a special airing of the two hour documentary Ivory Tower. The movie, which was released earlier this year, dealt with the growing problem of the increased cost of going to college, growing student debt — now approaching 1.3 trillion dollars, and the inability of students to find employment in their field. The movie raised some important issues and used the plight of the prestigious but small 950-student Cooper Union College in New York City as an example.
The private engineering, architecture and arts college established in 1859 was funded by a very large endowment, and up until last year tuition was free for those lucky students who could get in. However, construction of a $170 million building, high administrative costs (the college president’s salary was reported at $750,000) and some less-than-ideal management decisions resulted in financial disaster and the need to start charging tuition last year. That action prompted a student revolt that is still unresolved.
Original Cooper Union building.New classroom building.
A Politically Incorrect Omission
This example was used to highlight that perhaps colleges have lost their way by concentrating more on prestige rather than education. The size and cost of administration has risen significantly. Universities seem to be competing for bragging rights with each other through massive and luxurious construction projects while state funding diminishes. More time is spent doing high profile research by the faculty members while part time graduate students or adjunct professors actually teach the classes.
The disappointing thing about the Ivory Tower movie was the hand-wringing and focus on the high cost and poor job opportunities. However, they seemed to avoid the gorilla in the room — the choice of majors. One would think that someone smart enough to go to college would be smart enough to research job opportunities resulting from chosen majors. I had a colleague who lamented that his daughter graduated from a well-known New England college $80,000 in debt and was only able to land a $28,000 a year position — her major, journalism. I heard similar stories for other non-technical graduates.
It’s painful and it may not be politically correct, but some degrees are harder to earn and do pay more. I fault colleges for painting a rosier picture than is deserved for many non-technical majors. My son struggled through engineering school and his friends through computer science, accounting and pharmacy schools, but all got hired quickly and are doing quite well even in this weak economy. The real-life lesson, get a degree in a difficult and needed profession.
Thanksgiving
So what does this have to do with the geospatial community? This Thanksgiving I was thankful again that in 1989 I made the decision to pursue a master’s degree in GIS. I struggled with some of the course work, programming and learning ArcInfo 3.0 which was especially confusing at the time because it operated on Sun, DEC or Silicon Graphics workstations running UNIX, so one had to mentally separate the AI commands from the equally unfamiliar UNIX commands. For those of us who finished the master’s program it’s been full employment ever since. However, like other professions, the learning can’t stop, and we in the geospatial community are especially lucky, since there are many education opportunities ranging from brick and mortar schools to online and non-traditional education in subjects related to geospatial. Geospatial is also different from some professions in that there are many entry-level positions that don’t require a four-year college degree. Experience in those positions can be leveraged and ultimately expanded with online, college and graduate-level work to higher level positions.
When I started work in GIS in the early ’90s, we were happy just to be able to digitize paper maps and reprint them with needed updates. We did some limited analysis using buffers and overlays but not at the level found today. Today, geospatial technology has evolved to a point of ubiquity. We regularly collect a variety of imagery sources including satellite, aerial, LiDAR, UAV and ground collection with optical/multispectral sensors. Operations and analysis include the use of multiple online data sources, live AVL GPS tracking, advanced statistical methods, social media overlays, interactive 3D models and virtual reality simulations. Delivery has evolved from single thick client workstations to web services and mobile device apps. All of this requires computer programming skills that are evolving daily.
So?
So what does this mean to you? First, if you have the ear of high school students, try to steer them to an education that will actually get them a job. An easy major may facilitate a lot of partying, but they may be living with their parents for years after graduation. On the flip side, not everyone is suited for college and there are many trades that pay extremely well and offer rewarding and secure careers including geospatial technology.
Second, if you are in the geospatial field, don’t rest on your initial training. We all need to stay relevant, and there is a growing list of non-traditional online education that can build the skills and capabilities of new and existing geospatial professionals. When I was the GIS manager for the Atlanta Regional Commission in the ’90s. we needed someone who was an expert in dynamic segmentation, routes and linear referencing for our transportation planning and modeling. We didn’t have that talent in-house, and I would have hired anyone with that specific skill set — degree or no degree. We were fortunate in finding a graduate student with both the needed skills and broad GIS experience.
Emerging Education Opportunities
There has been a growing list of online education opportunities. For years Esri has been offering GIS classroom and online software courses, Microsoft programming courses and the Kahn Academy expanded online education with MOOC’s (Massive Open Online Courses) in many subject areas. More recently, edX, Coursera and the well-publicized Udacity, co-founded by Sebastian Thrun inventor of Google Glass. Udacity offers many technical online classes including a Georgia Tech Massive Online Master’s Degree in Computer Science. Add to this UnCollege, a social movement aiming to change the notion that “going to college is the only path to success,” and you can see that traditional colleges are in a potentially disruptive environment. Just like Uber and transportation.
GEOINT Education Success Story
For many years, Pennsylvania State University has been a leader in online geospatial education. Penn State offers both a United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF) accredited post-baccalaureate certificate in GEOINT applications and a graduate certificate in GEOINT analytics. Continuing the tradition of providing open educational resources, recently Penn State began to provide free geospatial MOOCs through Coursera.
The joint effort of Dr. Max Baber of USGIF and Dr. Todd Bacastow of Penn State puts Penn State among the eight universities that have achieved USGIF academic accreditation including Northeastern University, University of Redlands, the University of Utah, West Point, U.S. Air Force Academy, the University of Texas at Dallas, George Mason University and the University of Missouri.
According to Bacastow, a West Point graduate and retired Army major, Penn State’s for-credit program has served more than 5,000 students with about 2,500 of these students having already completed. The mapping MOOC has served more than 70,000 students. The GEOINT MOOC will open on January 14, 2015. You can view a video of Dr. Bacastow explaining the GEOINT MOOC here.
He cited numerous success stories including: a wife of a deployed sailor who earned her certificate and is now a lead geospatial architect at a three-letter agency; a severely injured Iraq Army vet who is now a contractor for NGA; a former infantry officer who now fills a key geospatial position at CENTCOM; and the stories continue with NGA currently trying to fill more than 1,000 positions.
Bottom line — don’t stop learning. The opportunities are there, especially geospatial.
P.S. Lest you think that I don’t take my own medicine, I felt that I was behind the power curve regarding social media and just getting by, so I signed up for a comprehensive online social media course so I could do a deep dive into the systems.
Rand McNally has launched a new online educational tool that delivers dynamic maps with social studies, history and geography content as well as reading programs and writing lesson plans. The online service, Rand McNally World Atlas, was designed to be cross-curricular and intuitive for both educators and students.
At the heart of World Atlas is an engine that allows educators to annotate and share maps. The flexible, easy-to-use tool lets teachers access historical maps, boundaries and demographics on present day maps; create custom maps; and easily share maps back and forth with students, teachers and other classes. Educators can print out a fully populated or outline map of any place in the world.
“Rand McNally World Atlas harnesses technology to help students understand the world around them,” said Stephen Fletcher, CEO of Rand McNally. “Not only does World Atlas illustrate and support topics across curricula, but the interface allows teachers and students to easily share ideas and assignments.”
World Atlas includes a variety of thematic maps and data layers including population density, climate, historical boundaries, and natural hazards. Maps can be annotated and customized, and then downloaded, printed and shared with other educators and students.
With World Atlas, it’s possible to:
Customize maps with a wide range of thematic overlays.
Use dozens of lesson plans and resources to help build presentations.
Access world event articles for reading and writing connections.
Print or download custom maps anywhere in the world.
Create individual accounts for students allowing them to customize and save their own maps.
Access from anywhere with an internet connection, from the classroom or from home.
Use one intuitive, easy-to-use tool for a wide variety of purposes.
World Atlas is aligned with state and the Common Core standards. The product is available via annual subscription from Rand McNally. For more information on World Atlas, or to sign up for a free online demo, visit World Atlas.
Jack Dangermond, founder and president of Esri, has announced that Esri will make its advanced mapping software ArcGIS available for free to K-12 schools across the country, reports FORBES. Through the program, students will have access to the same cloud-based GIS technology used by governments and businesses to map and analyze data. The program is set to benefit more than 100,000 schools, with each ArcGIS online account worth about $10,000, adding up to a total potential value exceeding $1 billion, according to Esri.
“This is not a new endeavor by us. We have been supporting GIS in schools for more than 25 years,” Dangermond told FORBES. “Bringing GIS into schools gets the kids very excited and indirectly teaches them different components of STEM education. That’s been illustrated at school after school.”
The idea began when Dangermond met with President Obama a few months ago to discuss how Esri can contribute to the ConnectED Initiative, a program by the White House to help strengthen STEM education for K-12 students. “I asked myself: ‘What’s the biggest idea that we can go for?’” Dangermond recalled. As soon as he proposed that Esri would offer its software for free for every K-12 school in America, the president was immediately on board. “We thought this is a way to scale it up and bring GIS education to schools in the whole country,” Dangermond said.
Esri previously experimented with the initiative on a smaller scale in different states. In Detroit, students used the company’s software to identify environmental issues and come up with plans to fix them. Students also have used ArcGIS to map health issues in Los Angeles and use demographic data to get Walmart products delivered to returning veterans.
The Geomatics Department at the Oregon Institute of Technology announces that beginning September 30, selected Geomatics courses in Surveying and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) will be offered online. These courses are designed for the working professional that desires formal education to advance in their career. All courses are fully accredited and transferable to the Geomatics degree.
The GIS courses are being taught by John Ritter, and the Surveying courses will be led by Mitch Duryea, PLS. Ritter and Professor Duryea are both faculty at the Oregon Tech campus in Klamath Falls.
Currently recognized as the regional center for excellence for Geomatics in the Northwest and listed as one of the six best Land Surveying schools, Oregon Tech combines theory, problem-solving, and field work in a computer-intensive curriculum that prepares students for employment and licensure as Professional Land Surveyors.
Oregon Tech is the only university in the Northwest to offer a four-year degree in Geomatics that is fully-accredited by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET). The department offers instruction using state-of-the-art technology, and Oregon Tech Geomatics graduates remain highly sought after by industry. Over 95 percent of students who graduate from Oregon Tech with a Geomatics degree are hired upon or before graduation.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the architecture and engineering occupations group which includes surveyors, cartographers, photogrammetrists, and surveying technicians is one of the top 10 occupational groups projected to have the fastest growth in employment between 2002 and 2012. Salary levels are expected to rise as demand for qualified professionals in these fields grows.
“We’re excited to expand our program online,” said Geomatics professor and Professional Land Surveyor, Mitch Duryea. “This offers us even more ability to reach students who are unable to attend our Klamath Falls or Wilsonville campus. At this time, we have 3-4 courses available online each term and have plans to add additional courses in the future.”
For more information about Geomatics online, contact Mitch Duryea, PLS.
Apogee Mapping has released amLibrary, a spatial data bundle that includes the company’s four flagship products and is packaged exclusively for use by higher education institutions.
The bundle includes Apogee’s amElevation, amHillshade, amContour, and amWater. AmElevation is a national dataset of 1-arc second digital elevation data (DEM); amHillshade comprises nationwide 40, 200, and 1,000 foot contours in a smoothed vector format; amHillshade is a national set of tiled raster topography offered in both grayscale and full-color; and amWater is a premium vector hydrography dataset derived from information generated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. AmLibrary also includes 50 data layers depicting environmental, climactic, and geologic data. Bundled together, this information provides GIS users with comprehensive and detailed terrain data that can be used as a basis upon which to conduct research and perform complex spatial analyses, according to Apogee Mapping.
AmLibrary is offered exclusively to colleges and universities in either MapInfo TAB format or ESRI Shapefile format. Full product documentation, layer, and metadata are provided with the product.
