Geospatial Educator’s Certification Program

[TomBaker]

The National Geospatial Technology Center of Excellence (the “GeoTech Center”) is excited to offer a Geospatial Educator’s Certification Program (GeoEdC).

The GeoEdC is designed for educators (middle school through college/university) who are seeking to increase their pedagogical skill-set and/or acquire a document certifying that they have the requisite technical skills, competencies, and knowledge to teach geospatial technologies (GST). GeoEdC is intended for educators with intermediate or above levels of GST experience who teach or are planning to teach GST. Example requisite skills include the ability to: 

• Identify data format types (e.g., Vector versus Raster).
• A working knowledge of geospatial software, such as ArcGIS Online, ArcGIS Pro, QGIS, or other GST software.
• Describe coordinate systems.
• Change layer symbology and visualize data in a map, graph, or chart.
• Create or acquire geospatial data and add that data to a map frame.
• Create, update, and utilize attribute tables.
• Query, select, buffer, and other fundamental geoprocessing tasks.
• Identify and use different editing and geoprocessing tools.

The benefits of the GeoEdC go beyond simply showing proof of expertise. Rather, the hands-on program provides educators with:

• Evidence of expertise to teach (or continue/begin to teach) workforce-aligned GST curriculum.
• Instruction regarding advances/changes in GST.
• A community of practice (CoP) in order to network, collaborate, and/or share content.
• Pedagogical techniques to effectively teach GST.
• Additional skills to create GTCM [careeronestop.org]-based (Geospatial Technology Competency Model) curriculum for real-world, work-related GST applications.
• Information to share with students regarding career opportunities in the GST industry.
• Notification to their respective administrators of the achievement.

Accepted applicants (limited to no more than 20 participants) will complete the 8-week, virtual GeoEdC program starting on September 25 and ending on November 19, 2023. The GeoEdC curriculum consists of weekly learning modules, culminating with a weekly geospatial technology mini project and a weekly mini “capstone” project (where participants will design their own learning module). The goal of each mini project is to introduce participants to a variety of pedagogical techniques/tools for different geospatial technology applications. GeoEdC participants will work with GeoEdC mentors and other educators in a collaborative setting. All resources created by the participants will be available to educators via the GeoTech Center website.

For further information (including how to apply), please visit: https://geoedc-kctcs.hub.arcgis.com/pages/home

The program is presently free.

Note, the application deadline for GeoEdC is August 18, 2023 (by 11:59 pm in your respective time zone). If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to Ken Yanow (GeoTech Center Associate Director) at kyanow@swccd.edu.

[R__MichaelCousins]

Tom,

Thanks for posting this! This is so awesome. I love the map on the Hub site showing all of the higher education institutions and what they offer. I've been looking for this for a long time!

I'm not sure who the owner of that layer/map, but would it be possible to add a field or a separate layer showing HBCU's called out? 

Would we be able to get our duel-enrollment High Schools that have a GIS Program added to that map as "Other"? 

Cheers - Mike

[TomBaker]

Mike, I'd suggest reaching out to Ken Yang. His contact info is at the very end of the blog post. I'll also email you directly with other contacts.  Thanks!  tb