GIS Education Weekly: Why Learn Open Source Software?

Resources for Teaching and Learning

Daily Mail: Men ARE better than women at reading maps... and it's all thanks to playing with Lego during childhood - Highlights of an article based on research by a professor from Aston University: "Professor Gina Rippon claims playing with Lego helps boys to think differently. She suggests contrasts due to ‘different experiences’ of growing up, not gender. The professor added map-reading is one area where there is a robust difference." @geospatialwomen asked for retweets by women who feel they are better map readers than the men in their lives.

LinkedIn: Why learn an open-source GIS solution? - Christopher Haakon Strutz of OSGIS offers his argument. Reminder: Open source software is commercial software. My advice to students: learn to use lots of different software. Why? Because whatever software (title, version, platform, etc.) you are using in school will most assuredly NOT be what you use further along in your career. You need to learn how to learn software (and programming languages, workflows, etc.) since you'll be using new ones all the time!

GIS Education Weekly: Open Source GIS Educator Perspectives

From Open Source Educators

Kurt Menke describes his understanding of open source at his Community Health Maps blog. He's the author of two books on QGIS, co-authored the GeoAcademy, and runs a GIS consulting firm, Bird's Eye View. I can share two of my pieces on the topic: Ten Things You Need to Know about Open Source Geospatial Software (Directions Magazine) and Proprietary vs. Open Source Licenses (Penn State OER).

Dr. Suchith Anand described what he learned lecturing students around the world. He's the founder of Geo For All and on the faculty at the University of Nottingham.

One of the important things I learned during my lectures to students in universities worldwide (from USA to India) is that the digital natives are very smart. They have a very global outlook and are keen to contribute to building a better world for everyone. I remember talking to a student and asking her what GIS software she uses and her reply was "We use all different platforms to learn GIS but no one can trick us to pay to buy GIS software when there is [a] lot of free and open software now available." This empowerment of students is exactly what we want. It is now not possible for any proprietary GIS vendor to put "Iron Curtains" on freedom on education tools.

Philip Davis reports the GeoAcademy site just passed 100,000 page views in 24 months.