The geography of economic, social, and environmental well-being and inequality. The course will provide an integrated perspective on the causes, interconnections, and consequences across time and space of, among others, globalization, climate change, poverty, employment, migration and urban growth, agricultural productivity, rural development, policies and international trade. Portraits of selected countries and regions will be developed.
Catastrophic Environmental Events (CCE) that are becoming more common i this time of global environmental change and it is essential that today's students be equipped with the knowledge and skills to be leaders as we, as a society, understand the upheaval that these CCEs are causing. Students will examine how CEEs shape human society and ecosystem from the interdisciplinary perspective afforded by the field of Geography. Students will use the latest geographic science concepts and techniques in exploring these events.
A systematic introduction to the processes and associated forms of the atmosphere and earth's surfaces emphasizing the interaction between climatology, hydrology and geomorphology.
Purpose: increase student knowledge of professional development opportunities in Geography through classroom activities and invited speakers, and to build awareness of career development tools and strategies. The main focus of the class is to prepare students to use the tools needed to pursue professional opportunities, including internships, jobs, and graduate school. Special emphasis will be on résumé building, cover letter writing, communication skills, and job, internship, and graduate school research.
Concepts and principles of Earth observation and remote sensing in relation to photographic, thermal infrared and radar imaging. Methods of obtaining quantitative information from remotely-sensed images. Interpretation of remotely-sensed images emphasizing the study of spatial and environmental relationships.
Contact department for information to register for this course.
How cities have been produced, consumed, and theorized as complex social, economic, ecological, and political systems; the main debates over geographical interpretations of the urban world; the major forces and inter-dependencies that shape internal spatial structure of the city and drive urban trends and public policy. (Human Geography)
Introduces conceptual and practical aspects of programming for geographic applications. The main focus is on developing a solid understanding of basic programming techniques irrespective of the specific programming language including variables, looping, conditional statements, nesting, math, strings, and other concepts. In addition, students will develop a proficiency in applying these basic programming principles to manipulating spatial data sources within the Geographic Information Systems (GIS).
Develops an understanding of the push and pull factors that have contributed to human mobility (migration) that has transformed the Americas. The class is divided in two parts: immigration and emigration from Latin American and Latin America migration to the United States. We will be interested in studying the migration shifts that have occurred in Latin America and the theories that help explain them.
The issues of climate change and land use change as two interlinked global and regional environmental issues and their implications for society and resource use are explored.
Digital image processing and analysis applied to satellite and aircraft land remote sensing data. Consideration is given to preprocessing steps including calibration and geo registration. Analysis methods include digital image exploration, feature extraction thematic classification, change detection, and biophysical characterization. One or more application examples may be reviewed. (Technical)
Analytical uses of geographic information systems; data models for building geographic data bases; types of geographic data and spatial problems; practical experience using advanced software for thematic domains such as terrain analysis, land suitability modeling, demographic analysis, and transportation studies.
This class provides an examination of land cover and land use change science, addressing the causes, impacts and projection of change. Key concepts of land use science are presented and recent research papers and case studies are reviewed. Class consists of lectures, invited presentations and individual student projects and presentations.
Methods of spatial analysis including measuring aspects of geometric features and identifying spatial patterns of geospatial objects that are represented as point, line, network, areal data, and 3-D surfaces.
Provide foundations and understanding on various issues related to modeling and simulation in GIS context. It will addresses the concepts, tools, and techniques of GIS modeling, and presents modeling concepts and theory as well as provides opportunities for hands-on model design, construction, and application. The focus will be on raster-based modeling. This course is also application-orientated, particularly in these fields such as terrain modeling, LULC modeling, hydrological modeling, suitability modeling, etc.
Intermediate course designed to teach students the techniques for Web development, particularly creating dynamic and data-driven Web applications. Introduces a high-level, object-oriented programming language such as VB.Net and the designing, coding, debugging, testing, and documenting for the development of Web-based applications. Other popular Web development tools such as DHTML, CSS and PHP are also covered.
Comprehensive instruction is provided in the advanced use of a commercial programming language and analysis tool used for scientific programming and data visualization, with an emphasis on applications in geography and remote sensing or GIS.
Designed as an introduction to mobile GIS, to the programming concepts underlying mobile GIS development, and more importantly, to the design and implementation of a mobile GIS application. Covers how to develop, test, and publish mobile GIS native apps working across two mobile platforms: Android and iOS. This course will also try to leverage the capabilities of JavaScript, Swift, Google maps, ArcGIS Server and runtime SDK to developing and publishing mobile GIS web apps.
Restriction: Open to GEOG, GIS, and ENSP-Coastal, Land Use, Global majors only. The aim of the course is to familiarize the student with the fundamentals of geospatial representations, such as spatial indexes and network data structures, and with techniques for manipulating geospatial information for geographic information systems, for spatially-based, for spatially-based decision systems and location-based services.
Each student must undertake a project as a demonstration of his/her competence in geospatial science and technologies. The data and materials for this project can originate from an internship (internal or external to the department), or from relevant work experience at the student's current employer. The Department of Geographical Sciences will work with each student individually to determine the best mechanism for obtaining the necessary data and experience.