Abstract

Delivering a GIS Curriculum to Rural Alaska
Track: Tribal/Indigenous GIS programs
Authors: Diane Sam, Michael Knapp

Interior-Aleutians Campus, UAF, developed introductory GIS courses for rural Alaska to meet needs in the areas of environmental and natural resource management, tribal transportation, ethnography, community planning and infrastructure management. This effort required the right partnership between a community campus with longstanding experience in delivering education to rural Alaska and a GIS professional with the ability and willingness to be flexible, develop pertinent place-based materials, and endure logistical issues associated with working in rural Alaska.

This presentation will inform educators and community planners in rural areas on some challenges and benefits of implementing a GIS skills development program for a rural and predominantly indigenous constituency. The presentation provides a place-based perspective on a GIS skills development program for sparsely populated areas that nonetheless are seeking to develop contemporary GIS skills in organizing databases and developing maps of traditional and contemporary land uses.