[Ica-osgeo-labs] Open Geospatial Science

[Suchith Anand]

Colleagues,

One of the key academic objectives of "Geo for All" is to firmly establish Open Geospatial Science as a discipline (academic journals, journal special issues etc) and thanks to our excellent academic colleagues we were able to achieve this in a very short time.

For example, the Open Access ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information special issue on Open Geospatial Science and Applications  (which is now getting ready) is aimed for this.
http://www.mdpi.com/journal/ijgi/special_issues/science-applications

Please note  that for  the special issue on Open Geospatial Science and Applications that we are editing (myself, Thierry, Barend, Serena, Franz-Josef, Luciene)  , the call for papers has been closed in Feb 2015 and we are NO LONGER accepting any new submissions. I thank ISPRS and the publishers for waiving the  article processing charges for all articles published in this Open access journal for our special issue.

But there are many other opportunities now for those interested to consider, for example the new Open Access Springer journal on Open Geospatial Data, Software and Standards. Details  at http://www.opengeospatialdata.com/

I also understand that many other GIS journals are also planning regular Special Issues on Open GIScience, so there are lot of other journals you can submit your research.

We will be discussing this at FOSS4G Europe -2015 to see how we can ensure that the Academic Tracks at the various FOSS4G and various GIS  conferences with Open GIScience tracks  globally  can be better streamlined for specific journals and how we can rapidly advance the discipline.

It is very essential that we continue establishing and expanding Open Source Geospatial Labs in universities worldwide to build firm foundations to rapidly expand the discipline. We are now actively working to further enable Openness in Geospatial Education (expand university programs through our labs worldwide, MOOCs through GeoAcademy  , PhD summer schools in both Open GIS and Geospatial Data , training programs for School teachers etc), so we are able to train and develop a new generation of  geospatial scientists globally. We believe in empowering people with spatial decision making tools to help build a better society for all of humanity.

As part of our next stage of expansion of "Geo for All", we want to focus on using the Open Geospatial Labs that we are building in universities worldwide to expand research by bringing together colleagues from other departments in the universities for expanding in  three key areas where there is Big Data focus in research and development (Urban Data Science , Transport Science & Applications , Environment and Climate Science ). This will help  expand our established research labs and to establish new research labs in  universities worldwide in Urban Science , Transport, Environment themes building on Open Principles (Open Data, Open Software, Open standards, Open Access to Research publications etc).  For new universities who wish to establish Open Geospatial Labs focussing on any of these research themes, we would be happy to hear from you and you can contact our regional chairs for details at http://www.geoforall.org/

I had good discussions today with Charlie who will be leading the GeoforAll meetings at FOSS4G 2015- Europe, Como, Italy  http://europe.foss4g.org/2015/    (July 14th-17th, 2015 ) to discuss and plan future ideas for our expansion.

Combining the potential of  Free and Open Source software, Open Standards, Open Data, Open Education Resources, we are now offering education opportunities to nurture and develop Open Minds in students globally for a better planet and better future for all.

We look forward to working with all in expanding Open Geospatial Science.

Best wishes,

Suchith 



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