Led by their hard-charging professor, a former top Pentagon official, they [Georgetown students] have translated hundreds of documents, combed through satellite imagery, obtained restricted Chinese military documents and waded through hundreds of gigabytes of online data.
The result of their effort? The largest body of public knowledge about thousands of miles of tunnels dug by the Second Artillery Corps, a secretive branch of the Chinese military in charge of protecting and deploying its ballistic missiles and nuclear warheads.
- WaPo
Participants in the crime prevention event “R U Safe?” created a map of the College Avenue [Rutgers University, NJ] campus last night [Dec 1], highlighting areas most prone to crime using a smartphone application called “Mobile Mappler.”
Designed by Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy lecturer Wansoo Im, the app allows users to select areas where they feel vulnerable to crime, said Jerilyn Krakower, coordinator of “R U Safe?”
The app, built on Google tech, includes data such as lighting and crime and invites crowdsourcing information on where users feel unsafe.
West Hartford, CT is having its hydrants mapped. And the whole program is led by fifth graders. No mention of GIS thus far, though there is a wiki which will hold latitude and longitude.
"Where in the Blazes R U?" is the manifestation of an idea that Taylor first had on a morning run last winter, and has been made possible by a grant she applied for from the Foundation for West Hartford Public Schools combined with funding from the elementary school PTOs.
The project's goal is being implemented by the town's 5th graders, who are learning to use GPS technology to map the coordinates of all 1,500 fire hydrants in West Hartford. The students will be using a wiki to input the longitude and latitude data for each hydrant. The project will benefit town residents as well as the fire department, and is a great example of service learning, where kids go out into the community to solve a problem.
Nova Scotia Community College seems to be losing its geomatics program:
The three members of the Applied Geomatics Research Group, established in 2000, were given their notices last week and their jobs terminated Nov. 30.
Affected by the decision are senior research scientist Bob Maher, scientist Chris Hopkinson and project manager Jeff Wentzell. Scientist Tim Webster was not affected by the staff changes.
- The Chronicle Herald via @mapserving
