[OSGeo-Edu] Getting ready for FOSS4Geo Sydney Birds of a Feather edu meeting

[Sunburned Surveyor]

Ned,

I like your idea, and I think it would be very useful for a lot of
"traditional" GIS users.

I would only add that I find video can often be a much better medium
than print for software tutorials.

Landon

On Mon, Oct 19, 2009 at 2:38 PM, Ned Horning <horning at amnh.org> wrote:
> Charlie,
>
> I guess I'm being a little slow here but I'm still trying to get a sense for
> what an OSGeo curriculum development effort would look like. There is a good
> deal of GIS curriculum out there so I'm not sure if redoing that makes
> sense. There has been mention of developing a curriculum around open source
> geospatial technologies but I'm not sure what that means. If we use open
> source software to support any curriculum I think we'd have to pick and
> choose which software to use and I'm not sure we want to do that.
>
> From a users perspective I have a sense for what I'd like to see but I'm not
> sure if this is in line with a broader group view. Would it make sense to
> create a list of server and desktop (perhaps pick one for starters) GIS,
> remote sensing image processing, and other geospatial tasks and then
> illustrate how each of those tasks is performed using different OSGeo
> software. I'm thinking of something along the lines of: "How Do I Do This in
> ArcGIS/Manifold?: Illustrating Classic GIS Tasks"
> (http://ecommons.library.cornell.edu/handle/1813/165). We could develop the
> framework and then work with each of the OSGeo projects to populate it with
> examples. This would be a great resource that could be used by teachers to
> more easily adapt existing curricula (private and public) to open source
> software. It would also be helpful for users. It would also get us working
> with the software projects more closely.
>
> Whatever we decide to do I expect to be able to help out during the next
> year.
>
> All the best,
>
> Ned
>
> Charlie Schweik wrote:
>>
>> Dear OSGeo Edu colleagues
>>
>> (Sorry for a longish email)
>>
>> With the FOSS4Geo conference coming up next week, I thought I’d try and
>> help focus our group in preparation for the Birds of a Feather meeting. I
>> hope whoever is in Sydney and interested in furthering the
>> education/curriculum efforts, you’ll sign up on the wiki [1]. Thanks for
>> Scott Mitchell, Venka Ragavan and Maria Brovelli for helping run that given
>> I won't be there. Perhaps one of you could do a report back on Edu
>> activities and what we are planning now to the OSGeo open session if there
>> is one (I'm assuming there will be). Let me know if you want talking points.
>>
>> But before I go on, I’d like to apologize to the group for my lack of
>> leadership over the last six months. The short of it is I have been the
>> primary caretaker of my mother, who has been seriously ill and in and out of
>> hospitals 6 times since June. I’m hoping that situation will get better, but
>> it has taken up a lot of my time. If you’d let me, I’m quite willing to
>> continue my role as the OSGeo edu chair, but given my performance of late I
>> am quite willing to step down if the group would like new leadership. This
>> might be a topic of discussion for the BOF and whether an election for a new
>> chair is in order.
>>
>> Now, to substance. I’ve edited our groups “to do list” on the OSGeo wiki,
>> and am suggesting that we as a group focus now on the “Curriculum”
>> discussion we’ve been having over email.
>>
>> Please see [2]
>>
>> What I’m suggesting is that people in Sydney have a discussion on this
>> proposal.
>>
>> What do you all think? If you all agree, should we try rapidly to find
>> some possible curriculum guidance in advance of next week?
>>
>> Lastly, a couple old tasks that I removed but still wonder about is:
>>
>> 1) Efforts to connect better OSGeo Local groups to education efforts;
>> 2) Efforts to connect better to OSGeo software groups somehow; and
>> 3) The FreeGIS Book - Victor's effort and the need for whatever is written
>> to be translated to English
>>
>> Are these worthy of staying on our task list? And any other
>> tasks/initiatives people want to take on this next year that I haven't
>> listed? Feel free to add it to the todo list wiki page [2]
>>
>> Finally, if anyone is willing to take on a kind of subcommittee chair on
>> any of these initiatives I would greatly appreciate it... ;-)
>>
>> Charlie
>>
>> [1] http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/FOSS4G_2009_BirdsOfAFeather
>> [2]
>> http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Education_Committee_Work_Program#PROPOSED_INITIATIVE_FOR_2009-2010_-_OS_GEO_CURRICULUM
>>
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>
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