The Corpus Christi Geological Society program started it. The Society worked with local residents and businesses to fund framed US geologic maps for elementary schools. Now the West Texas Geological Society is doing the same thing aimed to put maps in each elementary school in Midland and Odessa; the underlying goal is to spark student interest in science and geology in particular.

A donation of $150 puts a map, with a plaque about the donor into a school. Another way to donate is to learn about the map and make presentations about it; the society provides training.

- MyWestTexas.com

This week our editors use study from the UK which notes "pupils' dissatisfaction with a geography curriculum which they perceive as irrelevant" as a starting point to explore academic geography and geospatial education trends. What works at different grade levels? Does keying in on career options make sense? Should there be a grade school subject of geography? The demands from students, employers and educators leave us optimistic.

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That's the suggestion of an article in the Daily Mail (UK).

An Ofsted report found that many staff opt not to take pupils on excursions in case they fall foul of health and safety rules.

That in turn leads teens to opt out of a "dull" geography class that stays indoors. Participation is down 30% over 20 years in the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) - the certifcation tests for secondary school.

The State of Minnesota tapped into FireWise, an organization funded by Wildland/Urban Interface Working Team (WUIWT) of the National Wildfire Coordinating Group, aimed at involving communities in preventing fires, to map areas threatened by a blowdown of trees in 1999. The project is now up and running

Of note:

"The system utilizes Spatial Oracle, UMN MapServer and Java. Javascripting builds the front end html code for Web display."

Students do analytical work - mostly high schoolers, but also junior high students.

"The Minnesota Firewise program secured a modest grant from the National Fire Plan for the system to purchase software and hardware."

"...plans are in the works to allow the data to be displayed on a standardized client such as ArcGIS, Web Mapping Service (WMS), or Web Feature Service (WFS)."

- Government Technology

Specifically, the foundation gave $1.5 million to the Environmental Science and Policy Program at the College of William and Mary to establish a Center for Geospatial Analysis and a “teacher-scholar” postdoctoral program in the interdisciplinary environmental science program.

A geologist, associate professor Greg Hancock, will coordinate the establishment of the Center for Geospatial Analysis (CGA).

The school paper refers to GIS as "an emerging technology that uses computers to plot, layer and organize data." The center, it notes, is "one of the first in the nation at a liberal arts college of William and Mary’s size."

I'm hearing about more and more small focused GIS events like this one which is today: "Skidmore Regional GIS Conference of College Educators." (Skidmore is a small college in Saratoga Springs, New York. I've heard of it only because a family friend went there.) Todd Fabozzi of U of Albany will give the keynote: “The Challenges of Sprawl and Smart Growth in the Capital Region.”

Other presenters at the conference are Robert Jones, associate professor and chair of Skidmore’s Economics Department, on “GIS and the Time Dimension”; Jonathan Cobb, on “GPS in the 21st Century - An Overview of Current GPS Capabilities, Modernization Efforts, and Complementary Networks”; Sharron Macklin and Jenni Lund, on “ArcGIS and Google Earth: Rules of Engagement.”

- Skidmore College