Kevin Sweeney
Proper education assumes an even larger role as the scope of the GIS professional's responsibilities expands. Community colleges, with input from GIS professionals, are well positioned to graduate students versed in both general GIS concepts and local GIS issues. This paper summarizes the collaborative efforts between government GIS administrators and Pima Community College in Tucson, Arizona to develop a GIS certification program. As this paper demonstrates, such curriculum planning offers many potential benefits for both sides: valuable counsel and data sources for the community college, and an educated labor pool and professional development opportunities for the participating GIS organizations.
The field of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) continues to expand in both breadth and depth, emerging as a useful tool in increasingly diverse application areas. This growth constantly challenges GIS professionals to keep abreast of the latest developments while maintaining existing levels of production. Sources for understanding changes in the field are varied and include: software user conferences, vendor-sponsored workshops, software documentation, local organization seminars, web-based discussion groups, software vendor technical support, professional organization meetings, industry magazines and journals, internet searches, and academic education. While all of these resources are potentially valuable, academic curricula--if properly developed--represent an indispensable component of professional development.
Value of Academic GIS EducationSeveral factors contribute to the escalating significance of academic GIS education. The increasing complexity of the field and the associated knowledge demands placed upon GIS practitioners simply necessitate it. Gone are the days when an understanding of GIS theory alone sufficed as a basis for quality work. Successful GIS draws from a wide range of theoretical foundations, including cartography, computer science, geometry, network administration, computer and website programming, database management, image interpretation, graphic design, CAD, desktop publishing and others. On the job training can serve a GIS professional well in particular situations, but it may ultimately limit the ability to develop creative solutions or expand the influence of GIS into additional application areas. In addition, the market penetration of GIS software has put the tools of the trade into the hands of many under-qualified users; map products today are often generated by those with little or no cartographic training. Academic curricula can help solidify the level of professionalism associated with GIS, by ensuring a thorough understanding of the many facets that contribute to quality GIS output. Perhaps most significantly, those with some level of formal GIS education are destined to become the wellspring of our profession. More college programs in GIS emerge every year, generating an increasingly large pool of graduates. This group of individuals represents a direct source of staffing for the largest component of the GIS job market, the entry-level technician. If this trend continues, academic GIS curricula will become even more influential, the quality of such programs even more essential.
Community College AdvantageThe sources of academic GIS training continue to expand, running the gamut from graduate school programs to introductory material at the elementary school level. Fostering an increased awareness of the significance of geography and the potential of geographically-based information systems, all of these institutions have a role to play in the development of a GIS professional. The community college, however, is uniquely positioned to provide instruction specifically relevant for entry-level GIS positions. By its very design, a community college prepares students for the local job market. Aptly covering the theoretical elements of a technical field such as GIS, a community college curriculum also provides a balance of instruction in the skills necessary for employment. This blend of theoretical and vocational emphases represents an effective formula for students ready to enter the technical employment market and absorb the knowledge offered on the job. Community college curricula also address matters of local interest. This fact becomes particularly significant when considering issues of geography. Direct and regular exposure to localized data and questions serves community college GIS students well, particularly if they seek jobs in the immediate region. Encouraging the retention of this human capital, community college GIS programs also fulfill a basic goal of serving their community. The community college GIS program, furthermore, serves the GIS profession by producing a pool of potential applicants for the largest segment of its labor force.
Professional-Academic CommunicationFor a community college GIS program to produce graduates well versed in local matters, those dealing with such issues on a regular basis must inform its curriculum. Unfortunately, it is far too often the case that a communication chasm precludes regular and productive interaction between the academic and professional realms. Rooted in any number of factors from a perceived difference in goals, to inherent levels of prejudice, to a simple lack of initiative, such deficiencies of contact can become institutionalized. Once entrenched, attitudes that perpetuate this unfortunate distinction become a matter of course and contribute to a localized tradition of avoidance.
This culture of separateness is particularly damaging in the case of GIS. As it analyzes information to support decision-making, a geographic information system functions best with input from every potential source of data, from all pertinent perspectives. Ignoring an approach simply because it is traditional to do so only diminishes the results that emerge from a given GIS application or model. Likewise, a community college GIS curriculum has everything to gain from professional input. Indeed, a program that overlooks information from the local employment base can hardly claim to be a valid component of a community college. The information and experience that a GIS practitioner could provide represents "insider information" and is of inestimable value to a college graduate. A curriculum that incorporates regular contributions from local GIS professionals will simply provide a more comprehensive education for its students.
Collaboration BenefitsCollaboration between academic GIS programs and professional GIS is advantageous for all. As part of the initiative between Tucson-area government GIS and Pima Community College (PCC) detailed below, participants developed an inventory of anticipated benefits. Prior to beginning the work of collaboration and development of a GIS curriculum at PCC, this list helped justify the efforts as it highlighted the synergies that could arise from the collaboration. For ease of discussion, potential benefits were divided into those contributed by the community college GIS program and those coming from the participating government organizations.
Community College Contributions: A GIS curriculum can generate a qualified hiring pool--familiar with local data and issues--for entry-level GIS positions. The program would inherently promote the field of GIS, by continually exposing new students and others in the community college sphere of influence to information about the profession. This in turn solidifies and potentially expands the role of GIS in the local community. An established internship program could efficiently provide local GIS organizations with cost-effective staffing solutions. The community college would also be able to supply entry-level GIS classes to professionals seeking formal instruction. The college would be well positioned to develop modular, evening and web-based GIS classes for busy GIS professionals. Short courses developed as part of the GIS curriculum could also provide part-time employment opportunities for senior staff in local agencies.
Professional GIS Community Contributions: Administrative staff from GIS organizations could supply job listings and promotional materials to the community college. These individuals could also provide data and web site access to students, enabling class exercises in familiar, real-world problem solving. Based on their own needs and trends identified in the field, local GIS administrators could make curriculum suggestions, keeping programs relevant. Through internships and other on-site programs, GIS organizations could provide training and education for community college students. In addition to teaching the short courses mentioned above, senior GIS professionals could also lend their services as guest lecturers, exposing students to the realities of working as a GIS professional.
Over the last two years, administrators of government GIS organizations in the Tucson, Arizona metro area and various administrators and instructors at Pima Community College (PCC) have collaborated to promote and develop local GIS. Initiated in the summer of 2000 by myself and the head of the Geography Department at PCC, the preliminary endeavor to address difficulties in recruiting for local GIS Technician positions has blossomed into an effort to develop a GIS certificate program. There are numerous reasons for the expansion of our collaboration, not the least of which is an underlying desire on the part of participants--both professional and academic--to develop the presence of GIS locally. The inherent value of GIS has instilled a consistent desire among individuals from many different positions and backgrounds to promote its recognition and use as a tool for learning and decision-making. In that atmosphere, all that was required was a small spark of communication to initiate the subsequent process. I was fortunate to have the close connections with both local professionals and the community college to set this initiative in motion.
Tucson-Area Government GIS: On the professional side, the participants include GIS managers and other senior staff from all of the government agencies in the Tucson metro region. Represented in the process are: The Town of Marana, the City of Tucson, Pima County - Technical Services and Development Services, the Pima Association of Governments (PAG), the Town of Oro Valley and the Town of Sahuarita. Geographic Information Systems have enjoyed a long and successful history in the region; Pima County purchased one of Esri's earliest ArcInfo licenses and initiated its GIS in 1988. GIS practitioners in the Tucson area, moreover, have always prided themselves on a high level of interaction and communication. The municipal and county members of PAG regularly share all levels of GIS information among themselves, and joint participation in committees and workgroups is the norm. In this spirit of cooperation and extensive familiarity with government GIS, I have found it easy to organize a complete collection of professionals to represent the regional, county, and municipal agencies participating in the collaboration.
Pima Community College: Pima Community College, serving over 74,000 students on several Tucson area campuses and distance learning centers, represents the fourth largest multi-campus community college in the United States (McElroy 2001). The college's only GIS class is currently taught at its West Campus and is administered by the Geography Department. Because of its association with GIS and my own connections to the department head, Geography initially served as the sole PCC representative department. Later in the process, as curriculum development became the focus of our efforts, the Community Campus--tasked among other things with developing non-traditional instruction for working students--joined the PCC team. Still later, as the GIS program development moved forward, the Curriculum Office at PCC became involved, sponsoring a community employment survey and initial attempts at a feasibility study. Most recently, as discussions expanded to include the home location for a GIS program at PCC, administration at the planned Northwest campus joined our efforts. Due to an underlying and consistent desire to promote the benefits of GIS learning, I found it a simple matter to expand our collaboration process to embrace the agendas of these additional players, and to advance achievements at a rapid pace.
Results: GIS CurriculumAs of this paper, administrators at Pima Community College have decided to abandon any efforts to develop a GIS program. Reasons supplied for this decision include financial constraints and an indication of insufficient community support in the initial assessment of a Curriculum Office feasibility study. Although implementation of the program appears to be stalled indefinitely, the curriculum itself has been thoroughly developed. I am presenting the results of that work here, to assist others who might be considering the development of a GIS certificate program and in the hopes that this curriculum will be implemented at Pima Community College in the future.
Three-Tiered CurriculumUsing information gleaned from its Community Employment Scan, the Pima Community College Office of Occupational Curriculum recommended three certificate/degree options for students successfully completing the proposed GIS program:
Collaboration participants faced a challenge when selecting courses that would be included in the GIS curriculum, one reflecting an issue familiar to those working in the field. All participants agreed that any GIS program needed to include requirements for the basics: courses in GIS theory, cartography, remote sensing, computer science, database management, and others. The lack of training in these fundamental skills among entry-level applicants was noted by the GIS government administrators. Yet these professionals also indicated that due to the broad expansion of GIS application areas, specialization in particular components of GIS such as cartography, remote sensing, management, or computer systems administration represents an industry trend. The challenge then was to design a curriculum that incorporated sufficient coverage of core knowledge while it allowed students the freedom to experiment in different emphasis areas and ultimately choose a specialization. The solution was to organize classes into three levels:
Despite the decision by Pima Community College administrators to forego development of a GIS curriculum, the overall collaboration effort can be judged a success. As indicated in the discussion above, the initial and consistently underlying goal of the process was to increase levels of communication between representatives of local government GIS and PCC. The expansion of that idea to include the creation of a GIS certificate/degree curriculum was an unexpected (though welcome) development, always considered a particularly ambitious outgrowth of increased communication. It is certain that PCC participants in the collaboration committee would have pursued the curriculum development without any input from local government GIS, but it is equally certain that the resulting recommendation would have been inferior to that which we have generated together. It is the interaction, the sharing of ideas and perspectives, the collaborative effort on whatever level, that ultimately defines success. On their own, academic and professional organizations have much to offer the field of GIS. In combination, however, as this process has indicated, they are able to generate synergies and results otherwise beyond reach.
As with any such effort, there are lessons to be learned. The process evolving over the last two years here in Pima County has at the very least produced a set of recommendations that might assist others embarking on collaborative efforts:
What form should collaboration assume? The short answer is: contact, in any form. Joint efforts cannot occur without some type of initial effort, some level of interaction to start the process. As logical as this recommendation may appear, it can represent a source of obstruction to future success. As mentioned earlier, a culture of avoidance often hinders discussions of local professional and academic GIS development efforts. For whatever reasons, these two realms are often considered distinct camps, each with their own agendas, goals and processes. While they may in fact proceed in distinctly different fashions, the underlying goals--centered on promoting GIS--are often the same. As difficult as it can be in some situations, it is crucial that someone takes that first step to bridge the gap and establish contact.
How to initiate collaboration? With a decision made to take the initial step, the next consideration is how to actually proceed. The recommendation here will assume the perspective of the GIS professional approaching an academic institution. With the goal or a problem to be solved firmly defined, the first step is to select a department in the college. If the school already teaches GIS or includes a Geography department, these are obvious choices. If not, it would be best to select a department where GIS would fit well with the existing curriculum. One suggestion would be to approach a department that links easily with the GIS work conducted at one's own institution. Selfish motivations--determining how the community college can best make one's own job easier--are perfectly acceptable. If one's organization is successfully conducting a certain style of GIS work, than that work must be of value to the community. If the work is valuable to the local community, it is therefore worthy of focus by the community college. GIS collaboration with this emphasis would therefore benefit the professional organization, the community college and its students, and the community as a whole.
After establishing contact with a particular department, the next step is to initiate a meaningful dialog. Instructors or administrators at the community college must see the value of one's GIS work and the enthusiasm that accompanies it. It is helpful to discuss with college staff what data they are using, what hardware issues they face, what budget constraints they confront, and what level of GIS awareness--both in the department and among the college administration--exists. As this dialog continues, it will likely bring to light areas of common interest; where there are differences, it will reveal the potential for mutual assistance.
Whom to include? As the experience with Pima Community College has shown, the decision regarding whom to include in the collaboration process is crucial. For an effort such as this to succeed, there must be a lead individual or individuals from each side to organize the effort and determine who will take part. When deciding on participants, consideration must be given to such factors as qualifications, level of enthusiasm and commitment, and potential to contribute a perspective conducive to the whole. It is easy enough to invite everyone that comes to mind as a means of maximizing potential contributions. Indeed, in some situations where prospective participants are limited this may be the best approach. It is best, however, to avoid overlap in perspectives as much as possible, to further maximize the potential contribution of each participant.
Those already on a collaboration committee represent a valuable source of additional participant recommendations. Familiar with the group's overall goals, they are well positioned to suggest colleagues from their own organizations who might contribute. It is also advisable to consider representatives from outside the core academic and professional organizations who might have a stake in local GIS development. In the PCC collaborative effort, the inclusion of a representative from the University of Arizona working on a K-12 GIS outreach program resulted in a Transfer Path emphasis area we had all overlooked. Consideration was also given to representatives from the private sector, to solicit counsel from that segment of the local GIS community.
What about setbacks? Even the best-intentioned and most widely supported collaboration efforts will experience difficulties. The example presented in this paper is testament to that fact. Delays in program implementation, restructuring of supported recommendations, and even complete abandonment of realized agendas are all possibilities. The potential sources for these setbacks are numerous: financial constraints, communication disruptions, change in key personnel, restructuring of commitment levels, and even personality conflicts. Like all organizations, community colleges are to a certain extent political entities, run by administrators with agendas unaffected by the apparent benefits of GIS collaboration programs. Despite the best efforts to convince administrators that a collaboration promoting GIS is in everyone's best interest, enjoys widespread support, and can garner the college positive publicity, programs can be derailed.
While setbacks of any type are disheartening, they need to be kept in perspective. Time itself may bring about a change in the situation that permits a full--and perhaps even expanded--implementation of the original goals. The primary focus of collaboration on any level needs to be kept within sight. Simple dialog between professional and academic individuals with a common interest in GIS will in and of itself generate benefits, long before complex programs are developed or implemented, and before those at the highest administrative levels are involved.
GIS CertificationThroughout this paper, mention of GIS certification has only been made as it applies to one of the Pima Community College curriculum degree options. Certification has been a complex and volatile source of discussion in the GIS community for some time now, and a proper treatment of that topic is well beyond the scope of this paper. Certification does, however, play a roll in professional-academic collaborations concerned with the successful promotion of a GIS curriculum. No matter how qualified a GIS program, the tag "certification" instills upon it a certain level of legitimacy. Since the GIS profession as a whole has not yet reached consensus as to what represents a sanctioned certificate curriculum, any such program can therefore tout its apparent value. The PCC curriculum was developed properly, with consideration and input from a collection of qualified individuals; students holding a PCC GIS certificate would indeed possess valid credentials. With this in mind, collaboration participants felt justified exploiting the common perception that any GIS certificate is a genuine statement of quality education. The implementation of a certificate option would in this case provide graduates a legitimate means of enhancing their resume. Developing a certificate alternative also serves the promotion of a GIS curriculum; while they may only be vaguely familiar with GIS, college administrators can understand it in the context of a technical certification program.
Other aspects of the GIS certification discussion apply specifically to collaboration efforts. For GIS certification programs to be meaningful, they must ultimately present a consistent and specific range of core skills (Obermeyer 2002). If the GIS community adopts consistent certification guidelines, then any academic curriculum--existing or planned--will have to adjust to incorporate the sanctioned components. To facilitate such an eventuality, certification programs need to be designed with inherent flexibility. This consideration also serves the students well, by allowing the curriculum to adjust quickly to the rapid changes that characterize the field of GIS. Frank and Raubal (2001), for instance, highlight the need for academic institutions to adapt their GIS education programs to the emerging industry trend towards "small GI" enterprises, specializing in the commercial sale of small pieces of geospatial information. Considering the status of GIS in the professional world, Huxhold (2000), Obermeyer (1993) and others have made reference to D.L. Pugh's (1989) well-known delineation of eight key attributes that define a profession. Included in this list is the existence of specialized training, including academic certificate programs. Collaboration efforts that contribute to the development of GIS certification programs are, according to this perspective, also contributing to the perception of GIS as a bona fide profession.
I gratefully acknowledge several individuals for their valuable contributions during the entire Tucson government GIS - Pima Community College collaboration process. My thanks to Stephen McElroy (PCC-West) for developing the proposed GIS curriculum and for preparing the NSF grant designed to fund this effort. Additional thanks to Chris Lamar (PCC-Community Campus) for her eagerness to include local GIS administrators in the curriculum development process, and to Angela Zerdavis (PCC-NW) for her thoughts regarding implementation of a GIS curriculum at the college's newest campus. A special note of thanks goes to Mike Talbot (PCC-West) for working with me to initiate the collaborative efforts two years ago. I would also like to extend my appreciation to all of the participating government GIS administrators for their assistance with my efforts and their valuable suggestions. What started as a small idea two years ago has progressed to a tangible and exciting process, only because of the hard work and insightful input of my colleagues.