Week 7 - Press Release

Week 7 was our mid-course check in. We turned in an update on how our ESRI courses or internships were going, as well as an assignment to create a press release highlighting our internships. This was an opportunity to practice concise, journalistic writing, as well as showcase a little of what we had accomplished. I back-dated my press release to last September when I completed my internship with Roy Hyatt Environmental Center (RHEC). I am posting the write-up here, and it will also be available on the UWF Online GIS department blog in the next few weeks (http://uwf-gis.blogspot.com), along with the other student's press releases.

UWF GIS Student Completes Trail Mapping Project for Environmental Center

September 29, 2015

Spatially Accurate Maps Support Students and Visitors in Outdoor Classroom

Cantonment, Florida – Alicia Lindbom, a UWF Online GIS Graduate Certificate student has completed two trail maps for the Roy Hyatt Environmental Center (RHEC). This was the first time spatially accurate maps had been created for the center, and the project furthered the center’s educational goals and Lindbom’s GIS internship requirements.

The Roy Hyatt Environmental Center in Cantonment, Florida is part of the Escambia County School District. Here elementary students increase their understanding of science concepts through hands-on lessons and activities presented by the center’s teaching staff. While the center had a hand-drawn map in the office, they were lacking any accurate, portable maps of the roads and trails, causing difficulties when giving directions and preventing the development of map related lessons. “It would be great if we had a map I could pass out to visitors or use with the students during class,” stated Mary O’Connor, the director of RHEC.

Lindbom was notified of the unpaid internship opportunity in early summer by the UWF Online GIS Outreach Coordinator, Leah Lewis. After a discussion of mapping goals with O’Connor, Lindbom met with Lewis to develop a plan for the project. Using ArcPad 10 on a Trimble GPS device, which was donated for use during the project by the UWF GIS department, point data was collected along the roads and trails. The data was then imported, cleaned, and manipulated within ArcGIS 10.2. The final map products were created in black and white to reduced printing costs, and submitted to the director as PDFs to eliminate software compatibility concerns.

One of two trail maps produced by Alicia Lindbom. 

“The final maps produced are professionally done, easy to read, and have been extremely useful,” wrote O’Connor in her intern evaluation.

Lindbom accrued 31 internship hours with RHEC and earned 3^rd place in the 2015 Fall Northwest Florida GIS User Group digital media competition for her poster highlighting the internship. To learn more about Lindbom’s GIS mapping experience, visit her student blog at www.aliciauwf.blogspot.com.

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