Multidisciplinary Cooperation in GIS Education: A Case Study of US Colleges and Universities

This paper examines the degree of multidisplinary cooperation for Geographic Information Science (GIS) education programs that award GIS-related degrees or certificates at US colleges and universities. We classified departments and courses into ten major disciplines using Dewey Decimal Classification. In the 2007–2008 academic year, approximately 40 per cent of GIS education programs related to multiple disciplines and nearly 20 per cent were involved with more than three disciplines. Geography was the major provider of GIS education programs, but the ratio between geography-related discipline and other disciplines combined was approximately 1:3. Fostering multidisciplinary GIS education programs should strengthen geography in general as well as GIS education.     

Geographic Information Science as a Method of Integrating History and Archaeology for Battlefield Interpretation

Abstract

Geographic Information Science (GIS) and technology can be used to integrate history and archaeology for synthesis and interpretation. This study applies Geographic Information Science and technology to reconstruct the events related to a patrol from G Company, 2nd Battalion, 328th Infantry Regiment of the American Expeditionary Forces on October 8 1918 outside the village of Châtel Chéhéry, France that resulted in the award of the Medal of Honor to Alvin C. York. Evidence from documentary records, historic maps, and artefacts from a metal detector survey were incorporated in a spatial database. Spatial analysis of the database using GIS provided a more complete picture of events than either history or archaeology individually.     

Aboriginal Performance on Standardized Tests: Evidence and Analysis from Provincial Schools in British Columbia

Many indigenous populations are experiencing rural-to-urban migration. In making this transition, indigenous peoples are entering industrial societies where most income derives from wages or salaries, and formal educational achievement is crucial in determining economic prospects. This research analyzes the gap in test score results between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal students in public schools in the Canadian province of British Columbia. It finds a strong effect of school quality, as measured by non-Aboriginal achievement, on Aboriginal achievement. It also finds a nonlinear negative relationship between Aboriginal achievement and the number of Aboriginal students in a school over the empirically observed range. It thus suggests a possible trade-off and dilemma between, on the one hand, policies that enable Aboriginal students to concentrate in a few schools able to provide a culturally sensitive curriculum and, on the other, policies to maximize Aboriginal academic achievement.     

Coastal and marine studies in the department of geography and environment at the University of Aberdeen

ABSTRACT

The Department of Geography and Environment at the University of Aberdeen has a long history of coastal and marine teaching and research from the 1960s to the present day. Beginning with the work of Walton and latterly Ritchie, the paper traces the coastal and marine studies in the Geography degree programme, the development of the Marine and Coastal Resource Management degree, and the introduction of more recent courses such as Managing Our Coasts and Seas, Hydrography, and Land and Marine Conservation. Establishment of the Centre for Marine and Coastal Zone Management (CMCZM), and later the Aberdeen Institute for Coastal Science and Management (AICSM), provided a clear focus for continuing academic research into integrated coastal management and marine spatial planning. This complemented long-term involvement with Shell, SOTEAG (Shetland Oil Terminal Environmental Advisory Group), the Association for Geographic Information (AGI), OceanLab, the EUCC, and several Scottish coastal fora. The creation of the Unmanned Airborne Vehicle (UAV)/Unmanned Airborne System (UAS) Centre for Environmental Monitoring and Mapping (UCEMM) in 2014 brought together the role of remote sensing, GIS and photogrammetry in monitoring, mapping and modelling the coastal environment.     

Reflections on Recent Cognitive Behavioural Research with an Emphasis on Research in the United States of America

In this paper, I reflect on some of the more recent trends in cognitive behavioural research that includes work by geographers. In particular, I examine recent work on spatial decision‐making in the context of Intelligent Transportation Systems and Smart Environments, spatial cognition and human wayfinding behaviour, contributions to Geographic Information Science, and embellishing activity approaches that focus on episodic human behaviours. The paper emphasises that much of this research is multidisciplinary and that much of it is published in non‐geography journals. The paper concludes with some thoughts about future research directions, together with comments on how this research may influence the teaching and use of geographic concepts. ACRONYMS ATISAdvanced Traveller Information Systems CPMComputational Process Models CRTCathode Ray Tube DLDigital Library GISGeographic Information System GIScGeographic Information Science GPSGlobal Positioning Systems ITSIntelligent Transportation Systems UCSBUniversity of California Santa Barbara VEVirtual Environments     

School accessibility and academic achievement in a rural area of Taiwan

This study empirically analyzes the influence of school accessibility on student academic achievement in a rural area of Taiwan. The sample population comprised elementary and junior high-school students in Pinlin, a small village outside Taipei City, the capital of Taiwan. Data were obtained through a questionnaire survey and analyzed via linear regression and ordered logit regression for continuous grade point average and discrete letter grade, respectively. Compared with previous research, this study presents the following new findings: (1) similar to elementary-school children, travel obstacles also negatively affected learning achievement of junior high-school adolescents; (2) travel obstacles affected academic achievement more significantly for adolescents than children; and (3) travel obstacles affected letter grades more significantly than grade point averages in children. The empirical evidence indicates that travel obstacles explain the academic achievements of children and adolescents with moderate or weak significance.     

GIS进入历史地理学研究10年回顾

地理信息系统进入中国历史地理学研究已经有10年历史,本文回顾了这10年间以CHGIS为主要代表的历史地理信息化建设的主要成果,显示出这一手段已经成为历史地理某些方向的常规方法,特别在历史河流地貌研究中发挥了很大作用,使历史时期河流的相对精细形态得以呈现。以黄河"京东故道"重建为代表的空间矢量数据获得方法为学界相关研究树立了典范,在矢量数据重建的基础上,"度-簇"结构和"分形"在分析所获得的历史空间矢量数据方面具有很大前景。     

Delayed,deferred and dropped out: geographies of Filipino-Canadian high school students

Models representing the assimilation of post-Second World War immigrants to North America use the academic achievement of children of first-generation immigrants as a benchmark of social mobility. Filipino youths in Canada fall short of this benchmark – they neither meet nor exceed their parents’ academic achievements. While concern with outcomes is a useful starting point, I suggest that there is a need to interrogate how and where students are produced as different. To do this, I attend to the geographies in the narratives of youths gathered from Filipino high school students in Vancouver (unceded Coast Salish Territories). I examine how they negotiate the spaces of transnational migration, their lives as students and spaces where their educational trajectories are deferred and delayed. I argue that the geographies of transnational migration and family should be held together with spaces of the school and education when considering academic outcomes.     

Exploring youth socio-spatial perceptions of higher education landscapes through sketch maps

Previous research on broadening participation in higher education and Science Technology Engineering and Math has inadequately examined the role of place. This article explores the socio-spatial perceptions of youth of a college campus and changes in perceptions youth experience during their transition from being a university neighbor to becoming part of a university community. This study uses sketch maps and qualitative Geographic Information Systems to document the changing perceptions of 43 youth aged 14–18 during their participation in a university program. The results suggest that some students started to identify with campus spaces as a university student or employee rather than as a neighbor of the university.     

Evolving technology,shifting expectations: cultivating pedagogy for a rapidly changing GIS landscape

As humans and natural processes continuously reshape the surface of the Earth, there is an unceasing need to document and analyze them through the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS). The public is gaining more access to spatial technologies that were once only available to highly trained professionals. With technological evolution comes a requirement to transition traditional GIS training for the next generation of GIS professionals. Traditional GIS combined with non-traditional GIS (i.e. mobile and location media) and CyberGIS educational materials could attract new and diverse students into Geography departments while informing the next generation of geospatial tool builders and users. Here we pose an applied pedagogical framework for teaching cutting-edge GIS material to diverse student populations with varying levels of technological experience and professional goals. The framework was developed as part of the National Science Foundation (NSF) CyberGIS Fellows program and was applied as a course template at the University of Washington Tacoma’s Master’s of Science in Geospatial Technologies. We chart how the framework developed into a cyclical structure from our original conceptualization as a hierarchy. This changed the epistemological orientation accommodating the shifting technological terrain of the GIS landscape to improve the skills of those driving the machines.     

江右王学的学术传承与地方宗族的乡村实践——以明代中后期安福邹守益家族为例

明中叶以后,江右王门学者广建书院、频繁地举办讲会活动,不但推动了王阳明心学理论的发展,也使学术思想得到传承,并广泛流传于乡村社会。在学术思想草根化过程中,王门学者又将之与地方宗族紧密结合,在加快了宗族内部整合的同时,也使宗族更主动地承担起乡里的责任,如主持地方公共事务、教化乡里,维护乡村社会秩序,甚至为乡村利益而与政府谈判。江右王门的代表人物邹守益及其家族以书院为依托,以讲会为形式,以乡村事务为己任,不仅将学术思想转化为＂化乡＂理念,付诸于乡村社会实践之中;而且整合并凝聚了王门学者团体,成为重要的地方＂清议＂力量。     

‘We’re not very good at soccer’: gender,space and competence in a Victorian primary school

ABSTRACT

This paper draws on findings from a pilot project conducted at an inner city primary school in Melbourne, Australia. Inviting grade six girls and boys (aged eleven and twelve) to focus on spaces of their schoolground, we learned about the ways in which gender, age, ethnicity, language ability and sporting competence influenced active play and belonging. Informed by the understanding that schoolgrounds, gender and active play are socially constructed, and children are active agents in these constructions, the paper examines how girls and boys consider and negotiate spatial politics. The methods of participant-led photography, focus groups and thematic analysis, reveal how children understand gendered spatialities. A strong story emerged of girls’ experience of exclusion from active play spaces in particular, providing a perspective on the spatial and social performance of gender. The findings highlight the value of integrating a spatial analysis of schoolgrounds – and the gendered dynamics therein – for health, education and equity programmes.     

清代安徽当涂夏氏学术成就探析——兼论道咸之际徽州的学风

清代道咸之际,安徽当涂夏銮及其四子炘、燠、炯、燮研治经史,成就不俗,是徽州学派后期的中坚,也是典型的学术世家。探析夏氏两代的治学成就,以及道咸同之际徽州的学术风气的概况。     

Spatial accessibility and equity of playgrounds in Edmonton, Canada

Assessing spatial equity with respect to urban public amenity provision involves examining the association between amenity distribution and population need for amenities. Geographic Information Systems in coordination with local spatial autocorrelation, were used to investigate the association between neighbourhood accessibility to playgrounds and demographic and social need for playgrounds in Edmonton, while considering differences in playground quality throughout the city. The primary objectives of this study were to assess whether playground provision, for location and quality, in Edmonton is equitable and, more generally, to investigate the role that amenity quality plays in assessing spatial equity. The results indicate that playgrounds are equitably distributed within Edmonton, with the highest-social-need neighbourhoods having the greatest accessibility to playgrounds. However, once differences in playground quality are considered, there is less of an association between high-social-need and high-accessibility areas. The findings suggest that greater attention be paid to differences in playground quality within Edmonton and that spatial equity researchers give greater consideration to amenity quality when evaluating spatial equity within cities.     

Politywide Analysis and Imperial Political Economy: The Relationship between Valley Political Complexity and Administrative Centers in the Wari Empire of the Central Andes

This article tests a model for the political economy of the Wari Empire (AD 600–1000) of Peru. This model divides the empire into core and periphery zones. In the core, Wari political economy was organized to extract surplus agricultural production to feed the capital. In the periphery, the Wari strove to extract prestige goods. We suggest that there is a strong relationship between where the empire chose to locate its centers in the periphery and the political complexity of the local population in which the center was placed. We argue that in areas of low political organization sites should be located near the geographic center of a population. These sites will tend to function as local administrative centers geared toward the organization and exploitation of the area's wealth potential. In areas with more complex political organization sites should be located on the margins of a population. These sites should have functioned as gateway centers controlling, or at least profiting from, interregional exchange. Our model was systematically tested through the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS). The results suggest that much of the variability found in Wari site placement in the periphery can be explained by differences in local sociopolitical complexity.     

Action heritage: research,communities, social justice

Societies are unequal and unjust to varying degrees and heritage practitioners unavoidably work with, perpetuate and have the potential to change these inequalities. This article proposes a new framework for undertaking heritage research that can be applied widely and purposefully to achieve social justice, and which we refer to as action heritage. Our primary sources are semi-structured conversations we held with some of the participants in three heritage projects in South Yorkshire, UK: members of a hostel for homeless young people, a primary school, and a local history group. We examine ‘disruptions’ in the projects to understand the repositioning of the participants as researchers. The disruptions include introducing a scrapbook for personal stories in the homeless youth project and giving the school children opportunities to excavate alongside professional archaeologists. These disruptions reveal material and social inequalities through perceptible changes in how the projects were oriented and how the participants thought about the research. We draw on this empirical research and theorisations of social justice to develop a new framework for undertaking co-produced research. Action heritage is ‘undisciplinary’ research that privileges process over outcomes, and which achieves parity of participation between academic and community-based researchers through sustained recognition and redistribution.     

Archaeobotanical and GIS-based approaches to prehistoric agriculture in the upper Ying valley,Henan, China

Archaeobotanical survey has sampled a series of late Neolithic to early Bronze Age settlements in the upper Ying valley (part of the central plain of China) and provided useful data for understanding prehistoric arable ecology and farming during a period of increasing local social complexity. A combination of the modelling functions offered by Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and the data reduction possibilities offered by Principal Component Analysis (PCA) allow us to explore possible relationships between local arable ecology, crop-processing strategies and the natural environment. The results should be treated cautiously given the size of the analytical sample but suggest that differences in the natural environment around each site may explain varying patterns of wild food collection, while social and cultural factors may better explain variation in farming practice and crop-processing at different sites.     

Inherently vulnerable? Ethnic geography and the intensity of violence in the Bosnian civil war

Which geographic configurations of ethnic settlements are most susceptible to violence in ethnic conflict? Existing research on ethnic conflict focuses on regional configurations of ethnicity, thus neglecting how local vulnerable pockets of minorities may become primary targets for violence. The mechanism linking minority enclaves to more violence posits that the regional majority group will fight local minorities in order to (i) create ethnically homogeneous areas and (ii) remove potential support for the other group by the local minority. Minority enclaves that cannot easily receive outside support from their ethnic brethren are vulnerable and thus provide incentives to attack. The paper thus argues that the presence of vulnerable ethnic minorities in areas dominated by other ethnic groups heightens the perception of threat, suggesting that the implications of the ethnic security dilemma are more pronounced. The paper uses Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to develop measures of isolated and vulnerable minority enclaves. This novel measure captures local (micro) and regional (macro) patterns of ethnic settlements that remain veiled behind a focus on ethnicity in larger administrative units. In a quantitative case study of the Bosnian war (1992–1994), I show that the presence of local minorities within territories controlled by an enemy ethnic majority is associated with more violence. The results remain robust when accounting for the presence of the UN peacekeeping mission (UNPROFOR) and across several robustness checks.     

Citizen and government co-production of data: Analyzing the challenges to government adoption of VGI

With the recent rise of open government and open data initiatives, governments are increasingly adopting new approaches of citizen participation to support a more democratic, transparent, and inclusive government system. Among other forms of citizen participation, Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI) is one approach to connecting citizens and government. Accepting VGI as a way to update government data or collect near-real-time information from citizens can create a partner-like relationship where citizens voluntarily contribute time and effort to support government actions. However, as a relatively new approach to citizen participation and data collection, VGI requires evaluation from the perspective of governments. This research investigates the challenges and opportunities that governments have found through the implementation of VGI projects. Results are drawn from interviews conducted with 19 government organizations, revealing organizational and technical challenges that limit the adoption of VGI. Organizational challenges are associated with government mindset, implementation, and project management, while technical challenges involve development of the system and quality of data. Given these challenges, we derive recommendations within the phases of project initiation, implementation, and expansion that can foster VGI adoption in government.     

Care-less spaces and identity construction: transition to secondary school for disabled children

There is a growing body of literature which marks out a feminist ethics of care and it is within this framework we understand transitions from primary to secondary school education can be challenging and care-less, especially for disabled children. By exploring the narratives of parents and professionals, we investigate transitions and self-identity, as a meaningful transition depends on the care-full spaces pupils inhabit. These education narratives are all in the context of privileging academic attainment and a culture of testing and examinations. Parents and professionals, as well as children are also surveyed. Until there are care-full education processes, marginalisation will remain, impacting on disabled children’s transition to secondary school and healthy identity construction. Moreover, if educational challenges are not addressed, their life chances are increasingly limited. Interdependent caring work enables engagement in a meaningful education and positive identity formation. In school and at home, care-full spaces are key in this process.