Post date: Aug 13, 2013 3:16:06 PM
Continuing Your Geospatial Education
My day job isn't to develop and teach MOOCs. I'm the lead faculty member for Online Geospatial Education programs at Penn State. We offer 25+ online classes in GIS and Geospatial Intelligence. We serve people who are brand new to the Geospatial world as well as senior professionals through our Certificate and Master's Degree programs. We've been doing this stuff at a distance since 1999, serving thousands of students. We've won awards, because our faculty and staff are amazing people. Unlike a MOOC, our typical online classes involve very high levels of interaction with professors, and small class sizes to provide individualized attention.
Don't let this be your one and only experience with Geography. Aside from what we offer at Penn State, there are academic programs all around the world available to you. And if you can't afford to enroll in an academic program, most of our classes here at Penn State are available as Open Educational Resources, meaning that their content is free for you to use for self-study.
Jobs And Professionalism in Mapping
The New Geospatial Jobs and How To Be Ready For Them
Geospatial Revolution - Your Next Job
U.S. Department of Labor Geospatial Technology Competency Model
Geospatial Blogs and Forums
Cartotalk.org the only forum I'm aware of that's dedicated solely to map design.
Professional and Academic Organizations
NACIS - North American Cartographic Information Society, hosts of annual the conference I have never missed since first attending in 2005. The most fun I have at any meeting every year.
ICA - International Cartographic Association. I haven't missed an ICA conference since 2005, either.
CaGIS - Cartography and Geographic Information Society
URISA - Urban and Regional Information Systems Association
AAG - Association of American Geographers
IGU - International Geographical Union
UCGIS - University Consortium for Geographic Information Science
Cartographers Who Inspire Me
Cindy Brewer we once took 12 students around the world because we love maps so much.
David DiBiase my former boss and forever mentor; the best boss I've ever worked for.
Jason Dykes leading an amazing group of geovisualization researchers in London.
Sara Fabrikant directs a vibrant GIScience research center in Zurich. I may have had too many beers at her house once upon a time.
Ken Field has an excellent blog and keeps mapping real at Esri. Also the most engaged Cartographer on Twitter, I think.
Kirk Goldsberry the only cartographer I've ever seen on ESPN.
Daniel Huffman making really innovative maps all the time, like this one.
Nathaniel Vaughn Kelso develops amazing community resources like Natural Earth and recently joined Apple to make their stuff awesome.
Menno-Jan Kraak has paved the way in space-time visualization research for many years, is one of the nicest guys on the planet.
Alan MacEachren, my PhD advisor who made everything possible for me. Known for his book, How Maps Work.
Virginia Mason makes all kinds of amazing map stuff at National Geographic.
Tom Patterson making some of the most beautiful shaded relief maps you can find.
Robert Roth grad school friend of mine doing some of the most exciting mapping research at a school known for such things.
Andre Skupin inspires me every time he speaks, and makes me laugh really hard as well. Loves soup.
Terry Slocum writes the excellent go-to book for our craft. Incredibly nice guy, too.
Alex Tait does top-notch mapping for National Geographic and other high-profile clients.
Tim Wallace has a hand in a ton of interesting and beautiful mapping projects.
Sarah Williams leads a lab at MIT making some excellent urban-focused maps and visualizations.
Andy Woodruff monster cartographer and social butterfly. Helps make maps like these which you should buy by the truckload.
Jo Wood works with Jason Dykes and has a hand in some of the most beautifully functional geovisualization work I've seen.
Great Maps
Essential Geography of the United States you have a wall somewhere that needs this map.
Atlas of Design compendium of excellent contemporary cartography.
David Rumsey Map Collection beautiful historic maps, accessible on the web.
Borch Travel Maps I buy a lot of city travel maps - these are the best.
Typographic Maps beautiful and informative.
Mapping Tools & Data
Tools:
Esri Educational Licenses if you're enrolled at a University that has an Esri site license.
Geospatial Data:
Cartography Firms
University Research Groups
GICentre, City University, London