Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Summer Research Initiative (SRI)






Summer Research Initiative to Increase Diversity


The University of Maryland, College Park is the flagship campus in the University of Maryland system and is home to first-class researchers and research facilities. The university’s location, just nine miles from downtown Washington, D.C. and approximately 30 miles from Baltimore, provides access to some of the finest libraries, research centers, and professional opportunities in the country.

UMD BSOS Summer Research Initiative (SRI)
Our program provides rising juniors and seniors an opportunity to increase their interest in research careers in the  social and behavioral sciences, develop research skills, and learn about doctoral training with the goal of encouraging students to pursue doctoral degrees in the social and behavioral sciences. The program has a special emphasis on population groups underrepresented in these fields (i.e., African Americans, Hispanics, American Indians, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians or other Pacific Islanders).




I have improved tremendously as a researcher, scholar, and professional in my eight weeks at the University of Maryland.”
-2014 SRI Scholar

Program Details
This 8-week program will be held on the University of Maryland, College Park campus from June 1 - July 24, 2015Students will be provided a meaningful research experience by working with a faculty mentor in one of our nine academic departments (visit http://www.bsos.umd.edu for department list). We also supplement the research experience with lectures, workshops, and networking opportunities.  Students are provided round-trip airfare, meals, room and board in university on-campus housing and $3,150 (before taxes – amount includes stipend and meal allowances).





Basic Eligibility
·    Junior or senior status by Fall 2015
·    U.S. citizen or permanent resident status
·    Intent to pursue a Ph.D. in the social and behavioral sciences
·    We are especially interested in applications from students underrepresented in the social, behavioral, and economic sciences




Questions? Visit our website  http://ter.ps/BSOSSRI or contact us  bsossri@umd.edu

To apply, visit the CIC SROP website, click “Campus Profiles,” and select University of Maryland

 Application deadline: February 10, 2015

Monday, December 15, 2014

Graduation Survey December



December Grads- Congrats! We want to hear about your post-graduation plans!
Click the link below to share what your post-graduation plans include. The collected information is used to demonstrate the success of our graduates to your college Dean, future students, prospective employers, and the public at large, so your response is very important! The survey takes less than 5 minutes to complete. Please note that information provided in individual responses will be kept confidential. Survey results will be reported in aggregate.

When you access the survey you will be prompted to login with your Directory ID and password. Only those students reported as graduating in August/December 2014 will be able to access the survey - if you are unable to access and graduated in August/December 2014 please contact Adrianne Bradford at abradfor@umd.edu ASAP to receive access.


To start the Graduation/First Destination Survey - CLICK HERE.

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

Transit Analyst job posting (WSTC)

Note: position is gear towards less experienced applicants.  Located in New Carrollton, MD.  

The Washington Suburban Transit Commission (WSTC) is looking for an individual to provide analysis, recommendations and coordination for transit service in the Washington Region, with a focus on Montgomery and Prince George's Counties. This is a great chance to gain the knowledge and hone the skills needed for a career in transportation for someone with limited experience but with drive, dedication and strong quantitative analysis and writing skills.

Washington Suburban Transit Commission - Senior Transit Analyst
Posted 12/5/14 – Open until filled


This position serves as the Senior Transit Analyst for the Washington Suburban Transit Commission (WSTC). The Washington Suburban Transit Commission (WSTC) is a bi-county agency serving Montgomery and Prince George’s Counties. The Commission facilitates planning, coordination and funding for transit services in the region, including the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA), Montgomery County Ride On, Prince George’s County The Bus, and other providers in the region. The primary focus of this position is on providing lead worker level of planning work at the WSTC. This position will work closely with the staff of the Washington Suburban Transit Commission and the Director of the Maryland Department of Transportation's Washington Area Transit Office. Salary is $43,000- $55,000.

Examples of duties and responsibilities of the position include, but are not limited to: 

- Responsible for the analysis and evaluation of existing and proposed transit service.
- Conduct analysis of transit services in the region and develop recommendations to improve the efficiency and productivity of these services and an understanding the importance of transit service to provide connectivity to residents throughout the region, with particular emphasis on Title VI equity considerations.
- Participate in bus planning studies led by WMATA and other regional providers. 
- Conduct analysis of transit ridership and cost trends as well as service change proposals, and preparation of recommendations for service improvements.

Questions, cover letters, and resumes should be sent to the attention of Mr. Sean Egan, Washington Suburban Transit Commission, 4351 Garden City Drive, Suite 305, Hyattsville, Maryland 20785 at wstcjobs@gmail.com. EOE.



Friday, December 5, 2014

December Alumni of the Month

Name: Moustafa Mohamed
Major: Geographic Information Systems
Year of graduation: 2012

Current employment status:

·         Employer: Leidos Inc
·         Position: GIS Analyst

Did you/do you currently go to graduate school? No


Why did you want to be a GEOG/GIS/ENSP major?

I was lucky enough to travel the world and experience many different cultures and visit exotic places. My father loved to travel and took us on many trips during our summer vacations so I grew up with a very diverse view of the world. When I started attending UMD my interests were in the humanities, such as history, political science and anthropology, but I wanted a technical degree. GIS was the perfect choice in this regard because it was the best mix of both worlds. You can’t be an effective GIS analyst without taking human geography into account and in that regard, I was very fortunate to have experienced different cultures and visited other countries.

What internships or independent research did you do as a GEOG/GIS/ENSP major?

I interned with the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START). I was tasked with the GIS portion of the TCOTRN project. The nature of this assignment was to map potential drug and weapon road routes to the United States from Central America. Opensource GIS data was used in this project as well as NGA Geonames. The web of roads then became a network which we analyzed using the Network Analyst tool. I was tasked with this work for 6 months and it was very relevant to the work I did starting with Leidos.


What recommendations would you make to current GEOG/GIS/ENSP majors for career and academic success while they are still undergraduates?
I would recommend that undergraduates work on their programming as that will increase their job marketability significantly. I would also recommend that students attend the Geography Job Fair every semester. In addition, the GIS community is very niche so make as many friends/contacts as you can while you are still at UMD.

What recommendations would you make to current GEOG/GIS/ENSP majors for career and academic success after graduation?
After graduation, I would recommend that fresh undergrad keep their skills up to date. GIS is a rapidly changing field and there are new tools and programs for use coming available very often. In addition, the job market is very fragile and as a result it may take a while to get employed right out of college for those that choose to. Just keep applying and don’t give up.  

Geospatial/GIS job posting (Gro Intelligence)

Geospatial/GIS Analyst Job Opportunity in New York


Gro Intelligence is looking for an outstanding, collaborative, detail-oriented self-starter to join us as a Geospatial/GIS analyst. The candidate, who will work both independently and under the guidance of another Geospatial Analyst, must be comfortable working in a fast-paced and demanding environment. The candidate must also have the ability to communicate GIS concepts clearly to non-GIS users.
Interested candidates can send resumes to recruiting@gro-intelligence.com

Educational Requirements:
• Masters Degree in Geography, GIS, Environmental/Natural Sciences or related field AND 1 year GIS experience OR

• Bachelor Degree in Geography, GIS, Environmental/Natural Sciences or related field AND 2 to 4 years GIS experience

Technical Skills and Experience
• ESRI ArcGIS Suite (ArcMap, ArcCatalog, ArcToolbox), ArcInfo/Advanced Level License (10.0, 10.1, 10.2), Spatial Analyst Extension, Editor, ModelBuilder.
• Metadata creation, data management of geodatabases
• Basic cartography
• Familiarity with MODIS, Landsat, other satellite imagery products
• QGIS/GRASS
• Experience pre-processing and classifying satellite imagery
• Knowledge of LULC data and classifications
• Experience with NDVI, weather, soils data
• Knowledge of FGDC/OGC standards
• QA/QC
• Spatial Statistics
• USGS EarthExplorer
• GDAL knowledge a plus
• Python knowledge a plus
• Ability to research and develop datasets and identify use cases
• Comfortable working with large volumes of data

Tuesday, December 2, 2014

December Undergraduate of the Month 2014


Full Name: Elvis Herrera

Please provide a short summary of yourself by answering the questions below.
Background: Please provide a short summary of yourself including the following information: 

1) What major(s), minors, and/or certificates you are working on at UMD? 
I am senior majoring in GIS.

2) What are your interests within your program(s)?
I am interested in the programming side of GIS. Computer programming allows to use your creativity and problem solving skill and it has been an important tool to obtain in GIS.
I also have an interest in remote sensing due to the fact that there is so much data you can collect by using electromagnetic radiation on images as well as seeing how land has changed over time.

3) What previous jobs, internships, and volunteer experience have you had?
This past summer, I have participated the UMD BSOS Summer Research Initiative program in which give undergrads, who are planning to pursue a Masters/Ph.D., the opportunity to work on a project and be mentored by UMD researchers of their major.

4) Where you are from (optional)? 


Internship:

1) Where you are interning?
UMD department of Geographical Science working under Dr. Matthew Hansen’s team

2) What are your internship responsibilities? 
Doing supervised classification training for the project describe below.
I am also classifying forest cover loss on RapidEye sample images and comparing them to landsat images. What we are looking for is to see what RapidEye images are visible in terms of forest cover loss that Landsat does not identify. After this process, we will perform a quality assessment for both products.

3) What project(s) are you working on or contributing to?
The IPCC have created guidelines for countries to follow to monitor carbon stocks and emissions of greenhouse gases associated with Land Use, Land-Use Change and Forestry activities. Dr. Matthew Hansen’s team were ask by, the Ministry of Agriculture of Peru, to classify their country based on the IPCC categorize land areas into 6 classes: forest land, cropland, grassland, wetlands, settlement, and other land such as bare soil, rock, and ice. We classified these land areas using pre-processed Landsat 7 satellite image mosaics at 30 meter pixel resolution from 2010 to 2013, including data from the newly launched Landsat 8 sensor. The method used in this project employed a decision tree classification algorithm and a comparison to the results of the Hansen et al. (2013) global forest cover change map for quality assessment.

4) How is the internship experience relevant to your studies in Geographical Sciences?
I am using remote sensing in my current job.

5) What are your career goals after your graduate?

After graduation, I plan on attending graduate school. My goal is to continue learning and contributing in the field of GIS and remote sensing.

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Winter Classes 2015

Geography Courses Winter 2015

GEOG110: The World Today: Global Perspectives
Credits: 3
This class uses the context of regions of the world to explore the 21st century issues of climate change, development, politics, economy, and demography. Each region will be used to highlight aspects of sustainability.

GEOG130: Developing Countries
Credits: 3
An introduction to the geographic characteristics of the development problems and
prospects of developing countries. Spatial distribution of poverty, employment, migration and urban growth, agricultural productivity, rural development, policies and international trade.
GEOG140: Natural Disasters: Earthquakes, Floods, and Fires
Credits: 3
Students will examine how Catastrophic Environmental Events (CCE) shape human society and ecosystem from the interdisciplinary perspective afforded by the field of
Geography.

GEOG202: Introduction to Human Geography (ONLINE)
Credits: 3
Introduction to what geographers do and how they do it. Systematic stud of issues
regarding social and cultural systems from a global to a local scale.

GEOG211: Geography of Environmental Systems Laboratory
Credits: 3
A laboratory course to accompany GEOG 201. Analysis of the components of the
earth's energy balance using basic instrumentation; weather map interpretation; soil analysis; the application of map and air photo interpretation techniques to landform analysis.

GEOG306: Introduction to Quantitative Methods for the Geographic
Environmental Sciences (ONLINE)
Credits: 3
Topics include data display, data description and summary, statistical inference and
significance tests, analysis of variance, correlation, regression, and some advanced concepts, such as matrix methods, principal component analysis, and spatial statistics.

GEOG330: As the World Turns: Society and Sustainability in a Time of Great Change (ONLINE)
Credits: 3
Cultural geography course on society and sustainability. Course will cover
sustainability of societies on different scales, examining local, regional, and worldwide issues.
GEOG340: Geomorphology
Credits: 3
Survey of landform types and role of processes in their generation. Frequency of
occurrence and implications for land utilization. Emphasis on coastal, fluvial, and glacial landforms in different environmental settings. Landform regions of Maryland.

GEOG372: Remote Sensing
Credits: 3
Principles of remote sensing in relation to photographic, thermal infrared and radar imaging. Interpretation of remotely-sensed images emphasizing the study of spatial
and environmental relationships.
GEOG373: Geographic Information Systems (ONLINE  & LIVE)
Credits: 3
Characteristics and organization of geographic data; creation and use of digital
geospatial databases. Demonstrates use of geographic information system in society, government, and business.

GEOG376: Introduction to Computer Programming for GIS
Credits: 3
Introduces conceptual and practical aspects of programming for geographic
applications. In addition, students will develop a proficiency in applying these basic programming principles to manipulating spatial data sources within the Geographic Information Systems (GIS).


GEOG473: Geographic Information Systems and Spatial Analysis
(ONLINE)
Credits: 3
Analytical uses of geographic information systems; data models for building
geographic data bases; types of geographic data and spatial problems; practical experience using advanced software for thematic domains such as terrain analysis, land suitability modeling, demographic analysis, and transportation studies.