Education Week: Map: Time Spent in Class at US Correctional Schools - "On average, students in juvenile justice schools get roughly as much instructional time as their district peers. But 15 percent of those schools—many of them in Florida—average less than 20 hours of instruction a week."
University of Arizona: UA Looks at 'Digital Traces' to Help Students - "Sudha Ram's Smart Campus research tracks students' social interactions and daily routines via their CatCard usage — and leverages that information to make predictions about freshman retention." Yikes.
Resources
ISPRS: Education and Capacity Building Initiatives: The International Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing is supporting seven projects for 2018. I'm unclear on when the final products will be available.
GIS Lounge: The Argument for Greater Cloud-based GIS in the Classroom - A Kutztown University student argues for the cloud.
Programs and Courses
University of Wisconsin: UW-Madison expands GIS professional programs to meet workforce needs - "Building on the success of its Online Master of Science in Cartography and GIS, the university is adding three options for fall 2018 that will train people at any stage in their careers. They include two online certificate programs—one basic and one advanced—and a face-to-face accelerated master’s degree."
On and Off Campus
The Tribune: UNC’s geography club maps out the infrastructure of developing countries so emergency crews can respond better to disasters - The University of Northern Colorado's Geography and GIS Club hosts a "humanitarian mapathon" each semester. This month the goal was creating the roads and buildings of the Usme district in Bogotá, Colombia, "for the eventuality that a natural disaster will strike there."
WRVO: Hackathon winners create road map to track snowplows in Syracuse - The second hackathon, a collaboration between the city, Syracuse University's I-school, and AT&T, yielded a solution to mapping where plows had been in the city. Winners Dean Olin and Alex Sinfarosa were among 36 teams vying for a cash prize. They are not students, but the teams who took second and third were!
Mankato Free Press: MSU grad studies homicides in minority communities - Minnesota State University graduate Jeff Mathwig is research manager for the Center for Homicide Research. "The Minneapolis nonprofit collects and analyzes data about homicides in the U.S. The organization focuses its study on minority communities that commonly are overlooked by other researchers."
University of Wisconsin: Conversation with GIS Certificate Alum Carly Mertes - The certificate student worked in state government then went to a startup.
WIU: WIU Departments, Students Play Part in Search for Missing McDonough County Woman - "A search for a missing rural Macomb woman late last week was enhanced by the Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Center at Western Illinois University, the WIU Office of Public Safety (OPS) and several students from the law enforcement and emergency management academic programs." The center provided datasets and field volunteers.
Kings County News: Layers Deep - Round Hill map combines geography, heritage, culture, time along Highway 201 - "The map and its online equivalent are parts of Mapannapolis, the Age Advantage Association’s Annapolis Community Mapping Project started by local residents and students and staff at the Centre of Geographical Sciences (COGS) in Lawrencetown. COGS and Age Advantage Association unveiled the mapping project early in 2016 and have been adding layers of information ever since."
Certification News
OGC is considering offering Professional Certification. There's a market survey to explore the idea.
URISA is offering a webinar on the GISP exam process on April 3 and 4, 2018. “Preparing for GISP Certification Webinar” is a six-hour, two-day virtual event. It's free for URISA International members.
Industry News
CityLab: Who Maps the World? - "Too often, men. And money. But a team of OpenStreetMap users is working to draw new cartographic lines, making maps that more accurately—and equitably—reflect our space."
A professor of GIS at Fort Lewis College in Durango aims to provide students with the most relevant, up-to-date, and practical GIS education. He asks for input on a survey and plans to share the results with the Colorado GIS community. I'll do my best to find those results and share them.
For Students
Students can attend the Esri Southwest User Conference Plenary free. The event is at 9:00 a.m. on Tuesday, April 10 at the Omni Interlocken Hotel 500 Interlocken Blvd Broomfield, CO 80021. Register at go.esri.com/swucplenary with a student e-mail address for the complementary registration. After lunch there's a session with the Young Professionals Network.
USGIF: USGIF Extends Partnership with DigitalGlobe Foundation - The United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF) and the DigitalGlobe Foundation will grant 14 schools under USGIF’s Collegiate GEOINT Accreditation Program access to DigitalGlobe’s satellite imagery archive and cloud-based service Basemap.
Red Bluff Daily News: Forest GIS workshop offered at Shasta College - The GIS for Forestry workshop is on March 23-24 and include basics (What is GIS/GPS), discussions of careers, data collection and hands-on exercises as well as drone demos. It's accessibly priced, too.
LinkedIn: The top 10 things I learned in my 5 years at USGIF: Darryl Murdock shares what he learned at a non-profit. I think many, if not all, of his points are applicable to doing any job well.
Money
National Science Foundation: NSF support helps advance research in geography and spatial science - A list of the 2017 grantees. Nice to see some names I know on that list.
Williamsburg Yorktown Daily: W&M research lab gains $2.95 million to track HIV/AIDs in Côte d’Ivoire - "AidData, a research lab at William & Mary's Institute for the Theory & Practice of International Relations, has received $2.95 million in funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development to support an open geospatial data center in the country of Côte d'Ivoire."
Industry News
Science Daily: How does the brain's spatial map change when we change the shape of the room? - "A new study explores the consequences of distorting the shape of the enclosing box on cognitive maps of space. The results detail how our cognitive maps adapt to changed environments and shed light on how distinct types of neurons may connect to form these maps."
The Denver Post: Colorado Springs map provider closing after 40 years - "MacVan Map Co., which has been producing maps of the Pikes Peak region for 40 years, will close March 31."
Science Daily: How does the brain's spatial map change when we change the shape of the room? - "A new study explores the consequences of distorting the shape of the enclosing box on cognitive maps of space. The results detail how our cognitive maps adapt to changed environments and shed light on how distinct types of neurons may connect to form these maps."
The Denver Post: Colorado Springs map provider closing after 40 years - "MacVan Map Co., which has been producing maps of the Pikes Peak region for 40 years, will close March 31."