Advanced Geospatial Analytics

This current page is specific to the accomplishments I accrued during my participation in the GIS 520 - Advanced Geospatial Analytics course in Fall, 2014, and is comprised of three sections, Course Overview, Course Modules, and Course Reflection.

Course Overview:

This course was offered through North Carolina State University as partial fulfillment for the Graduate Certificate of Geographic Information Systems, which I attended through the Distance Education program. It was the sequel to GIS 510, Introduction to Geographic Information Science. Both courses emphasized the ArcGIS software. GIS 520 explored some of the more advanced tools available in this analysis software package with the goal of providing skills that empower us to perform geospatial analyses and to communicate the results of these analyses through clear and concise maps. Eventually, these communications will help guide decision making processes that include geographic or spatial components.

The Learning Outcomes for this course were:

• Integrate and analyze data in various formats
• Search for, retrieve, evaluate the suitability of, and integrate datasets for specific types of analysis applications
• Describe the analysis capabilities of various kinds of geospatial technologies
• Identify data limitations for particular analytical applications
• Select and perform appropriate advanced geoprocessing functions for specific objectives
• Apply appropriate analysis techniques for different types of decision-making objectives
• Build simple customizations for the ArcMap user interface

Course Reflection:

GIS tools provide powerful means of collecting, integrating, and analyzing data across many different disciplines and applications. Through the activities in this GIS 520 course, we gained experience with methodologies that facilitate all of these components. I enjoyed being introduced to the multitude of sources that are available for the acquisition of data that can be used to answer some of my research questions. For those data that are not necessarily formatted in an immediately useful way, GIS tools offer means that can facilitate re-formatting and integrating that data, such as georeferencing. I also appreciated introduction to the tools that help analyze the data, such as spatial analysis and spatial statistics. As a plant physiologist working on field agricultural research and in my extracurricular interests, such as with our mushroom mapping project (Our Mushroom Hunting), these tools will be invaluable as we work toward a better understanding of how our biological and ecological systems interact.