[Geo4All] Enabling the Right to Benefit from Geospatial Scientific Progress and Its Applications

[Suchith Anand]

Dear colleagues,


Youth Mappers are organising a community mapathon during AAG 2019 in Washington D.C  and GeoForAll will be supporting this excellent initiative.  We will be using the opportunity to bring together a panel of key educators and thinkers to discuss these principles and their importance in enabling the UN’s Right to Benefit from Scientific Progress and Its Applications.


We are especially looking for expert panelists esp. from developing countries who have interest in open education and open knowledge initiatives to join and share their expertise. Details below.



AAG 2019 Panel on  “Enabling the Right to Benefit from Geospatial Scientific Progress and Its Applications”


Andy Anderson (Amherst, USA), Suchith Anand (University of Nottingham, UK)



Geographic Information Science and Technology (GIST) are important contributors to the advancement of human knowledge, as well as for the attainment of the UN Sustainable development goals. Through there have been huge advances in GIST over the last few decades, the benefits of geospatial education and entrepreneurship opportunities are very limited for economically poor students and communities, due to the expense of the technology. However, the last decade has seen a rapid growth in free and open source geospatial software along with the development of many open data resources, based on open standards. Together with open educational resources and open access to research publications, these Open Principles in Geospatial Education have significantly lowered the barrier to the use of GIST by the broader public.


Disseminating these advances is in keeping with the Right to Benefit from Scientific Progress and Its Applications promoted by the United Nations [1], which “includes (a) access by everyone without discrimination to the benefits of science and its application, including scientific knowledge; (b) opportunities for all to contribute to the scientific enterprise and freedom indispensable for scientific research; (c) participation of individuals and communities in decision-making and the related right to information; and (d) an enabling environment fostering the conservation, development and diffusion of science and technology.”


How do we enable access to geoeducational opportunities for all? How can we help everyone enjoy the benefits of geospatial scientific progress and its applications? How can we create a global community of practitioners committed to advancing open principles in geospatial education? This panel will bring together key educators and thinkers to discuss these ideas and possibilities.


The panel is proposed by the GeoForAll community [2] and is in association with YouthMappers [3], which will be organizing a community mapathon adjacent to the conference.


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If you are interested in participating in this panel, please register for the AAG 2019 conference to obtain your conference PIN, then send it along with your presentation title, abstract, and author(s) as soon as possible but no later than November 2 to Andy Anderson (aanderson at amherst.edu<mailto:aanderson at amherst.edu>) and Suchith Anand (Suchith.Anand at nottingham.ac.uk<mailto:Suchith.Anand at nottingham.ac.uk>).


Best wishes,


Suchith



[1]https://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/CulturalRights/Pages/benefitfromscientificprogress.aspx

[2] https://www.osgeo.org/initiatives/geo-for-all/

[3] https://www.youthmappers.org




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