page 5 UCGIS News: Education

The Association of American Geographers (AAG) and managing editor David DiBiase have executed a memorandum of understanding leading to publication of the first edition of the Geographic Information Science & Technology Body of Knowledge (GI S&T BoK). Following approval by the UCGIS Board of Directors, the editorial team delivered a complete manuscript to AAG on February 25. The monograph is expected to appear in late July 2006. (The team also includes Michael DeMers, Ann Johnson, Karen Kemp, Ann Taylor Luck, Brandon Plewe, and Elizabeth Wentz).

The GI S&T BoK is a product of the UCGIS Model Curricula initiative. Founded in 1998, a Model Curricula Task Force chaired by Duane Marble envisioned an innovative, adaptive curriculum that enabling undergraduates to develop the diverse competencies needed to apply and advance GIS&T in government, industry, and academia. Central to the Model Curricula vision was a Body of Knowledge – a comprehensive inventory of the subject matter that pertains uniquely to the GIS&T domain. Following similar initiatives in such fields as Computer Science, Information Science, and Project Management, the Task Force produced a draft GIS&T BoK as part of its 2003 Strawman Report. The manuscript submitted to AAG for publication in February 2006 is an elaboration of the draft BoK with contributions by more than seventy scholars and practitioners, including thirty-one reviewers. It includes 330 topics defined in terms of 1,660 educational objectives. Future editions are expected to update and improve the 2006 edition.

Although it was conceived originally as a basis for undergraduate curriculum planning, the editorial team expects the GIS&T BoK to be useful to individuals and organizations in many different ways. The GIS&T BoK will help:

Job seekers, who wish to assess and communicate their experience and skills more clearly and accurately.
Employers, who need to identify knowledge and skill requirements for their employees, and who need to assess applicants’ competencies.
Geospatial professionals, who wish to better characterize the tasks they need to complete, to more easily locate resources that best meet their needs, to plan continuing professional development strategies.
Certification bodies, which need to determine the set of knowledge and skills that make someone a novice or expert in particular areas, and to create standard means of evaluating their applicants’ competencies.
Accrediting bodies, which seek to evaluate the core needs of education resources of different types (including undergraduate, graduate, professional, and informal education).
Education and training providers (including colleges, universities, professional trainers, and software vendors), which need to plan, implement, assess, and revise their programs.
Students, who wish to benchmark their educational achievements, or to identify programs and courses that provide education in their areas of interest.
Authors of professional and academic publications (including magazines, books, and textbooks), who will benefit from a standard foundation and terminology on which to can frame their own ideas.
GIScience researchers, whose work will extend the current Body of Knowledge.
The geospatial profession, which will gain wider recognition as a distinct and coherent field.

An Education Committee priority for 2006-07 is to promote the BoK through presentations at professional conferences (including ESRI User Conference, ASPRS, EUGISES, and AGILE) and publications (including a piece in the forthcoming Blackwell Geography Compass). In addition to prompting applications of the BoK, the objective of this promotional effort is to set the stage for a 2nd edition of the BoK by recruiting a broadly inclusive community of editors and contributors.

UCGIS and GISCI

UCGIS became a member organization of the Geographic Information Systems Certification Institute (GISCI) n November, 2005. UCGIS delegates David DiBiase and Francis Harvey represent UCGIS on GISCI’s Board of Directors, which meets monthly. As of June 15, 2006, GISCI had certificated 1,116 “Geographic Information Systems Professionals” (GISPs). GISCI staff refer to the UCGIS GI S&T Body of Knowledge is used by GISCI to determine the eligibility of applicants’ educational achievement point claims. GISCI president Lynda Wayne and Executive Director Scott Grams will attend the 2006 Summer Assembly. Ms. Wayne will present an education keynote address entitled “UCGIS Body of Knowledge: Benchmark for a Profession.” Grams will participate in a following panel discussion on Applications of the GIS&T Body of Knowledge.

Please welcome Lynda and Scott when you see them at the Summer Assembly.

ASPRS Certification update

At the Education Committee meeting on Wednesday the 28th, Mike Renslow will present a brief overview of the ASPRS Certification Program for professional and technologist certifications, followed by the introduction of a new certification program titled “Provisional Certification.” The Provisional Certification program is designed for students in the spatial sciences who meet the requirements for certification but have yet to acquire employment experience. Through this process, they can pass peer-review and the exam, become provisionally certified while in school, and when they achieve the required experience, become certified.

GITA, AAG, and Wharton Define the “Geospatial Technology Industry”

In September 2004, the U.S. Department of Labor Education and Training Administration (DOL-ETA) awarded $6.4 M to support six projects that proposed to address perceived workforce needs of the “geospatial technology industry.” The grants were awarded as part of DOL’s “President’s High-Growth Job Training Initiative,” which targeted investments in 14 fields including geospatial technology. The Spatial Technologies Industry Association (STIA) received $695,362 for a proposed one-year project entitled “Geospatial Industry Awareness and Opportunities.” The award was transferred to the Geospatial Information and Technology Association (GITA) in 2005. In partnership with AAG and the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, GITA proposed to:

develop standard definitions of the geospatial industry sector, vet the definitions through industry leaders, and disseminate the results throughout the industry;
develop content for an online workforce information clearinghouse on industry, jobs, education facilities, and program information;
create a national image and outreach campaign; and
work with community colleges, employers, and workforce development organizations in a selected region to test the use of the Geospatial Industry Workforce Information System (an industry-developed and funded information network), housing industry jobs, educational facilities and programs, and the industry outreach materials to help local One-Stops and educators meet local geospatial industry needs.

DOL ETA (2005) http://www.doleta.gov/BRG/pdf/Geospatial_GITA_Geospatial%20Industry%20Awareness%20and%20Opportunities_7-16-5.pdf

In partial fulfillment of objective (1), GITA, AAG, and the Wharton School hosted two “thought-leader roundtables” in Washington DC in October 2005 and February 2006. Several UCGIS delegates, including Education Committee members Ann Johnson, Karen Kemp, Duane Marble, and David DiBiase, participated in these events. One product is a draft “Phase I Report” that is available at a “Geospatial Industry Workforce Information System” Web site at http://www.aag.org/giwis/ The draft report includes seven recommendations concerning (I) industry definition, (II) a rationale for market segmentation, (III) new occupational titles, (IV) a method for estimating workforce demand, (V) revisions to the Geospatial Technologies Competency Model, and (VI) actions needed to close “the gap between geospatial workforce demand and supply.” For example,

The draft recommended industry definition is: “The geospatial industry acquires, integrates, manages, analyzes, maps, distributes, and uses geographic, temporal and spatial information and knowledge. The industry includes basic and applied research, technology development, education, and applications to address the planning, decision-making, and operational needs of people and organizations of all types.”
Draft new occupational codes include: “GIS/Geospatial Analyst” and “GIS/Geospatial Technician” (DOL representatives advised roundtable participants that two new codes are the most that can be expected to be adopted in the near future.)

Comments on the draft report are invited through June 20, 2006, and should be directed to Mary Ann Stewart (mstuart@gita.org), GITA Project Manager for DOL-ETA High Growth Grant.

United State Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF)

In consultation with UCGIS, the U.S. Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF) announced its plan to form a Geospatial Intelligence Academy in 2004. The Academy’s mission is to develop and promote curriculum guidelines and a voluntary accreditation process for use by educational institutions that wish to develop and offer certificate programs in geospatial intelligence. A panel of experts from industry, government, and academic institutions continue to meet to develop the guidelines and standards. The panel has relied upon the pre-publication version of the GI S&T Body of Knowledge as a primary source for its curriculum guidelines. Academic panelists include:

Curt H. Davis, University of Missouri Center for Geospatial Intelligence
George F. Hepner, University of Utah
Bruce A. Ralston, University of Tennessee
Steven D. Prager, University of Wyoming
Todd Bacastow, Penn State University

UCGIS Virtual Seminar 2005

Students and faculty members at six UCGIS member institutions participated in the latest UCGIS Virtual Seminar in Fall, 2005. The Geographic Information Systems Certification Institute’s (GISCI) publication of a Code of Ethics (http://www.gisci.org/code_of_ethics.htm) inspired the seminar topic.

Program of the 2005 Virtual Seminar in Ethics for GIS Professionals

“The GIS Code of Ethics.” William J. Craig, Center for Urban and Regional Affairs, University of Minnesota.
“Other Organization's Codes of Ethics.” Steve Ventura, Department of Soil Science, University of Wisconsin-Madison
“Troublesome Technologies and Furrowed Brows - Understanding Hostilities Towards GIS.” Rich Harris, School of Geographical Sciences, University of Bristol
“Human Tracking and Geoslavery.” Jerome Dobson, Department of Geography, University of Kansas
“Questions About Ethics for GIS Professionals.” Francis Harvey, Department of Geography, University of Minnesota.
“GIS and Communities.” Francis Harvey, Department of Geography, University of Minnesota

Speakers offered live presentations (audio and slides) in which students and others participated via a desktop Web conferencing system. In addition to real-time audio and textual chat conversations during the presentations, asynchronous discussions took place in the weeks following each presentation in Penn State’s “ANGEL” learning management system. Presenters also used ANGEL and local Web sites to distribute readings and project assignments. Students and faculty members also met weekly at their institutions for face-to-face discussions.

The Virtual Seminar was successful in involving more than 50 students from multiple institutions. Speakers’ ability to present from their own offices without incurring the costs and inconveniences of travel encouraged participation. Presenters did need to rehearse presentations to become comfortable with the Web conferencing technology. They also needed to respond promptly to student comments and questions in the asynchronous discussion fora; unmoderated discussions soon degenerated into blog-like opinion swaps. The assistance of an instructional design specialist at the host institution (Penn State) was important, and local face-to-face discussion sessions were crucial. The lead time required to plan the seminar and recruit participants was about one year. Dawn Wright (Oregon State), David DiBiase (Penn State), and Francis Harvey have since submitted a proposal in response to NSF’s “Ethics in Science, Engineering, and Technology” solicitation that proposes to institute the ethics seminar as a regular offering at the three institutions, and to share curricular materials nationwide.