Using Geographic Information Systems
to Transform Teaching and Learning
Wendy Guan, Center for Geographic Analysis
Amy Cohen, Harvard School of Public Health
Paul Cote, Harvard Design School
Carla Tishler, Harvard Business School
June 23, 2011
CGA: Spatially Enabling
Research and Teaching
• Founded in 2006
• A member organization of the Institute for
Quantitative Social Science (IQSS)
• Serves the entire University – anyone with a HUID
• Supports research and teaching with geospatial
technology (often called geographic information systems or GIS)
CGA Basic Services
• Maintaining help desks in both campuses;
• Consulting with students, faculty, and staff on
research and teaching projects and grant
proposals;
• Providing non-credit group instructions in
geospatial software applications on a regular
basis;
• Assessing, organizing, financing for, and
maintaining university site licenses for software;
• Providing hardware and support for geospatial
tools;
• Undertaking initiatives that improve the university
infrastructure in relation to geographic analysis.
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CGA Training
• Credit courses at FAS, SEAS, HSPH and DCE
• Non-credit training every Friday: 2-hour
instruction and hands-on labs, 10 topics
• Summer and Winter 10-day GIS Institutes
• J-term 4-day GIS Camp for undergraduates
• Customized GIS modules for non-GIS courses
• Annual spring conference on a major topic in
GIS
Fall, 2010
Course: African Landscape
Professor: Suzanne Blier
Ben Lewis provided a guest lecture to teach students with no GIS background how to bring geospatial materials
into their course blogs. Students were taught how to bring materials from AfricaMap into Google Earth and
Google MyMaps for mark up, addition and manipulation. From there students were shown how to bring live or
static maps into their blogs to create arguments supported by information from AfricaMap and other sources.
Visualizing
global oil
with Google
Earth
Jeff Blossom gave a presentation "Using Google Earth as a Classroom Tool“ at the Oil and the
Contemporary Globe (August, 2009) workshop. Workshop attendees were K – 12 educators, learning
how to incorporate oil related subjects into their teaching. Global oil datasets were prepared, and
Google Earth was used to visualize global oil production, consumption, pipeline locations, GDP, and
population. The data is available for download: http://maps.cga.harvard.edu/oil/
Digital Atlas
of Roman &
Medieval
Civilization
Guoping Huang and Giovanni Zambotti conducted DARMC workshops teaching students majoring
in history how to geo-reference historical maps and turn paper maps into digital GIS datasets.
Population
ChinaMap – an
online system for
study and analysis
of Modern China
Lex Berman gave lectures about ChinaMap to:
• Advanced GIS Workshop [Gov
1009] Spring 2011
• Harvard Extension School - Geographic
Communication Today DCE ISMT-E155,
Spring 2011
• Harvard MIT Chinese Politics Research
Workshop, GSAS, Spring 2011
Environment
Historical Data
ChinaMap – an
online system for
study and analysis
of Modern China
Basemaps
•
Above: Qing Dynasty Entry Exams
locations (symbol size shows density),
overlayed on Physiographic Macroregions
and the Qing Courier Routes and Stops.
•
Right: AMS 1:250K topo map (pre-1960)
overlayed with modern railways, high
speed rail, and urban area (purple) near
the city of Luoyang.
SEAS ES 103
Spatial Analysis of
Environmental and
Social Systems
Sumeeta Srinivasan teaches several GIS and
spatial analysis courses in FAS, SEAS and HSPH.
Above: Conditional Plot shows the
relationship between the Gender
Development Index GDI, and Human
development index (HDI) in Nepal with respect
to spatial distribution of Infant mortality ration
(IMR).
Left: understanding attractive vs. repulsive
point patterns helps the study of phenomena
as widely varied as crimes (are burglaries and
motor vehicle thefts attractive?) or plant
species (certain species tend to grow together,
others away from each other).
CGA Help Desk
Where:
Cambridge Campus
Rm K-00A, Lower Level
Knafel Building , CGIS
1737 Cambridge Street ,
Cambridge, MA 02138and
Longwood Campus
Micro Lab, Lower Level
Kresge Building
677 Huntington Avenue
Boston, MA 02115
When:
Tuesday, 1:30pm - 4:00pm
Email:
contact@help.cga.harvard.edu
Website:
http://gis.harvard.edu
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GIS at HSPH
GIS & the Origins of Public Health
Broad Street cholera outbreak,
London,
1854
Source: Wikimedia Commons
GIS at HSPH
• Environmental Health
– Pollution exposure, natural & built environment
• Society, Health and Human Development
– Demography, neighborhood effects
• Epidemiology
– Geographic patterns of disease and exposure
• Global Health and Population
– Demography, health and geography
• Biostatistics
– Spatial analysis
GIS@HSPH: Courses
1. Intro. to Spatial Methods in Public Health,
GHP534, Marcia Castro
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–
–
–
Spatial autocorrelation in health-related data
Clustering patterns
Spatial estimation of disease rates
GIS and Remote Sensing applied to health data
2. Geographical Information Using ARCGIS,
BIO504*, Sumeeta Srinivasan
*No longer offered
CGA support for GIS@HSPH
•
•
•
•
Several workshops taught at HSPH
Weekly office hours at HSPH
Students attend summer Institute at CGA
Resources used by students and researchers
– CGA website with self-help resources
– CGA newsletter
– GIS user groups
IT Support for GIS:
Software tools available at HSPH
•
•
•
•
•
ArcGis
ERDAS Imagine
Google Earth
Geocoding
Statistical packages with specialized spatial
analysis procedures
Examples of Student Work
• Effects of the Built Environment on Health and
Health Behaviors
• Air Pollution and Asthma
• Neighborhood and school environments and
youth physical activity levels.
• Green Space and BMI in Cairo, Egypt
• Health and Food Access
Effects of the Built Environment on
Health and Health Behaviors
Student work:
Peter James,
Environmental
Health and
Epidemiology,
HSPH
Obesity rates
Proximity to
businesses, on foot
County sprawl
Air Pollution and Asthma
Proximity of
subjects to air
monitoring
stations
Student work:
Rima Habre,
Environmental
Health, HSPH
Health and Food Access
Student work: Caitlin Eicher, Dept. of Society, Human Development, and Health, HSPH
BMI Distribution in Boston Youth
Student work:
Dustin Duncan,
Department of Society,
Human Development,
and Health, HSPH
GIS & Public Health: The Future,
What Students and Faculty Say
Core competency
for any analyst
dealing with
quantitative data
Necessary
competency for
my career
Applicable to
almost every
field in public
health
Promoting a Culture of
Information Stewardship
At the Graduate School of Design
Paul Cote
Harvard University
Graduate School of Design
Harvard
University
Graduate
School of
Design
500 Design Students
250 Architecture
50 Urban Planning
100 Urban Design 100 Landscape
A Knowledge Engine
GSD Studio Culture:
75% of Student effort focused
on one studio problem
100 Studios per year at the
GSD
Focus on representing,
understanding, modifying and
evaluating places: Appearance
& performance
Many Many Models are
Made!!!
An intense replica of the
greater world of design
Information Lifecycle in Design (Business as Usual)
Start
Collect Resources:
Site Photos
GIS Data
CAD Data
Documents
Process Understanding
End of Term
INDIVIDUALS ADD COHERENCE TO INFORMATION
Synthesis / Study:
Maps
Digital 3D Models
Physical 3D Models
Simulation Models
Bulk of Knowledge
is Lost
Working Drafts:
Adobe Projects
GIS Projects
Video Compositions
Renderings & Video
Sources / Bibliography
RETURN ON INVESTMENT
Few Resources
Fit for Re-Use
Final Documents
+ 20 Minute Presentation
Promoting a culture of information stewardship
Two Front Strategy:
1. Courses and Studio Support
2. Maintain a rich environment for self help and sharing
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Courses & Core Studio Support:
GSD2201: Site Representation and Research
Workflows for Cultivating Information in Design and Planning Practice
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Course & Studio Support: GSD2201 Site Representation and Research
Workflows for Cultivating Information in Design and Planning Activities
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Tools
Workflow
Course & Studio Support: GSD2201 Site Representation and Research
Workflows for Cultivating Information in Design and Planning Activities
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Tools
Workflow
Course & Studio Support: GSD2201 Site Representation and Research
Workflows for Cultivating Information in Design and Planning Activities
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Course & Studio Support: GSD2201 Site Representation and Research
Workflows for Cultivating Information in Design and Planning Activities
Demo of course web site and student projects in Google Earth
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Flagship GIS Course
GSD6322: Fundamentals of GIS. Theory and Applications
Critical Viewpoint on GIS as a Way of Knowing
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GSD6322: Fundamentals of Geographic Information Systems
GIS as a Way of Knowing
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GSD6322: Fundamentals of Geographic Information Systems
GIS as a Way of Knowing
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GSD6322: Fundamentals of Geographic Information Systems
GIS as a Way of Knowing
Translation of problem into Conceptual and Procedural Models
Eric Beaton (09)
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GSD6322: Fundamentals of Geographic Information Systems
GIS as a Way of Knowing
Estimation of spatially explicit
implications of models.
Eric Beaton (09)
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GSD6322: Fundamentals of Geographic Information Systems
GIS as a Way of Knowing
Deriving new information based on spatial relationships.
Eric Beaton (09)
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Maintaining an Environment of Data and Tools
Self Service GIS Tutorials on the Web
GSD Data Collection
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Harvard Business School
•
•
•
•
Carla Tishler, Director of Program Innovation
Educational Technology Group
18 team members
Serving: 200 faculty, 1800 MBA students,
8,000+ Executive Education participants
• Producing: 25-30 courseware and platforms
annually
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Global Data Visualization (GDV)
• Business History course: Entrepreneurship and Global
Capitalism
• Elective curriculum and doctoral course
• Student understanding of globalization is a key theme
at HBS
• The GDV Globalization of business from the 19th
century to the present
• Faculty member Geoff Jones, Professor; Director of
Research, Entrepreneurial Management
• Low-tech, but make an impact
• Three versions—next version will use Google and be
more modern
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Global Data Visualization (GDV)
• Research
– Harvard undergraduate
– doctoral student
– HBS Baker Library
• Mapping research data to countries
• Slides from CGA
• Animations and design HBS
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Global Data Visualization (GDV)
• 37 datasets
• Political economy
– Urbanization, literacy, League of Nations
• Commodities
– Bananas, coffee, oil
• Global Corporations
– Coke, Singer, Pampers
• Managing Distance
– Sea Cables, telegraphs, mobile phone use
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Global Data Visualization (GDV)
A quick walkthrough
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