Surveying and Land Information Systems

 

VOLUME 60, No. 1 (2000)

 

Surveyors and GIS-The Professional and Educational Challenges

Joshua S. Greenfeld

 

The role of surveyors in GIS is one of the hot topics among surveyors and GIS professionals.  Surveyors view their role in GIS as essential to ensure the quality and appropriate usage of GIS.  This role is consistent with the surveyor’s mandate to protect the welfare of the public in land/location matters.  Consequently, several states passed (or are in the process of passing) legislation that mandates the participation of the surveyors in the GIS.  Therefore, sanctioning the participation of surveyors in the GIS process.  The GIS community does not view this legislation favorably.  Aside from obvious economical consequences and professional issues of such legislation, the GIS community argues that surveyors are not sufficiently educated and trained in GIS.  Therefore, sanctioning the participation of the surveyor in the GIS legislation, very few surveyors get involved with GIS.  Lack of participation of surveyors in GIS on the one hand, and making their involvement in GIS mandatory on the other, could prove to be risky for the surveying profession.  When the GIS community challenges this legislation, other long established activities that require a surveying license may be challenged as well.  The surveying profession must examine why surveyors are not getting involved with GIS and what surveying education adjustment must be made to prepare surveyors to step up to this challenge.  This paper presents results of a survey conducted among surveyors on these two questions.

 

A Professionals Guidebook:  How to Start and Properly Support a Four-year Geomatics Engineering Program

James K. Crossfield

 

Geomatics professionals have the best of intentions, yet they typically squander scarce resources when attempting to develop educational programs.  Leveraging faculty position is described.  The ideal relationship between two- and four-year degree programs is explored.  Insights into the mindset of college and university administrators are provided.  Once established, programs require professional attention and care.  Recruiting assistance, scholarship support, equipment loans, funding or donations, advisory council activity, student summer jobs, and permanent jobs after graduation are required.  Current employer techniques for handling new hires are described.  The value of written employment offers and of carefully managed and monitored training programs is indicated.

 

Teaching Surveying Ethics by Distance

Steven Frank

 

The Department of Surveying and Engineering at New Mexico State University and the Department of Spatial Information and Engineering at the University of Maine joined to offer a one semester-unit distance education class-Surveying Ethics-starting in January 1998.  The same instructor (the author) teaches the course at both universities.  The course is available either over the Internet of by video correspondence. Differences in registration procedures, course completion length and school policies between the two universities have been overcome with excellent staff help.  At any one time there are usually 4 to 10 students enrolled in the course.  To date about 30 students have gone through the course.  Because the nature of the course is self-paced, many students fail to complete the course.  The course is being used by several state registration boards as a condition of receiving or reinstating professional surveying licenses.

 

First Experiences Adapting Procedures of Student-centered Discussion to a Land Surveying Class at Pennsylvania State University

Wesley Parks

 

An attempt to adapt features of student-centered discussion (SCD), which was developed at Pennsylvania State University, to a land surveying class in Penn State’s Wilkes-Barre Surveying Program is described.  Preliminary results are presented in terms of material covered, level of student participation and student response. As intended, SCD places responsibility for learning at least partly in the hands of the students. Material learned was learned in depth by almost all students in the class. However, because students controlled the direction of discussions, not as much material was covered.  Student-centered discussion appears to develop students’ ability to listen, read and perceive, and, in particular, to critically analyze situations and to effectively problem-solve.

 

A Trial in the Classroom:  Training for the New Millenium

Salvatore A. Marisco, J.D.

 

The surveying program at Penn State University offers a capstone course “Professional Aspects of Land Surveying” which ends the semester with the holding of a mock trial.  This paper discusses the journey that surveying students go through in preparation for a mock trial is designed to prepare them for their day in court as expert witnesses.

 

Intergration of Technology into a Surveying Engineering Curriculum

H. Turner and F.A. Neto

 

The Surveying Engineering Program at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, incorporates the “Mapping Sciences Center of Excellence” supported by Intergraph Corporation and Trimble Navigation.  This center contains at least 200+ Pentium class computers, 23 ImageStations capable of supporting “Roam” operations, and several GPS receivers.  Over the past four years significant changes have been made to the Surveying and Civil Engineering curricula to incorporate this computer and instrument technology.  For example, the faculty are now able to teach photogrammetry supported GIS, boundary law and engineering.  The content and objective of a course must be evaluated in terms of industry as well as local government needs.  Part of any successful course must transpire outside of academic institutions and connect the surveyor to the communities served.  Emphasis is placed on the necessity of transferring such connections and knowledge to the surveyor-to-be.  This paper will describe the educational model developed, outlining the necessary steps the university had to take to support the model.

 

Articulation Planning I Geographic Information Science: New Opportunities

Gary A. Jeffress, Osbourne B. Nye, Dean E. Ayres, and Kenneth L. Russell

 

Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi’s new Bachelor of Science degree program in Geographic Information Science (GIS) is seeking to expand its ability to attract students in order to satisfy the demand for educated professionals in surveying and GIS.  The program was planned by university faculty, researchers, an active member of the Texas surveying profession, and a senior GIS manager in a large Texas state government agency.  The objective of this four-year program is to prepare students for a number of options upon graduation, including continuing education toward advanced degrees, employment in the GIS market, or professional land surveying.  The program offers two emphases: (1) geographic information systems, or (2) geomatics.  New opportunities for articulation with four-year universities and community colleges, collaborative grant-writing, industrial partnerships, and applied research are now being pursued.  A multidisciplinary advisory team meets annually to assess the appropriateness of the curriculum and the progress of its students.

 

BLM and NMSU-A Cooperation in Teaching

Steven Frank

 

The Department of Surveying Engineering at New Mexico State University and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management Cadastral Division have cooperated over the past four years in teaching a Public Land Surveying Systems course (SUR 292).  The author lectures using the BLM 1973 Manual of Instructions, while BLM Cadastral Surveyor of Thomas Maestas teaches the lab section.  In the lab, students are signed up as BLM volunteers and are taken on ongoing or recently completed BLM cadastral surveying projects.  This experiment has allowed students to learn field procedures and effective search and identification techniques of BLM and GLO monumentation, while also providing them with “hands-on” evaluation of field evidence.

 

Integration of Information Technology into the Surveying Course at Penn State University

Francis W. Derby

 

Information acquisition, processing, management, and dissemination methods are undergoing evolutionary changes.  In surveying, the need for adaptation has compelled employers to seek employees with the requisite exposure to information technology.  This requirement imposes new demands on surveying graduates, especially from the undergraduate programs.  The surveying graduate is expected not only to possess the ability to apply the latest information technology, but to understand the implications of the data processing methods as well as the quality and usefulness of the results.  It is the responsibility of educators and researchers to keep pace with technological advances and to empower students to transfer the technology to the industry.  This paper highlights some of the efforts within the Penn State Surveying Program to expose undergraduate students to information technology as applied to the surveying profession.

 

Geomatics Engineering at the Ohio State University: Design, Implementation and Accreditation

N.W.J. Hazelton

 

The development and implementation of the new Geomatics Engineering Program at the Ohio State University (OSU) is summarized, highlighting its relationship to the Surveying Program it replaces and the existing Mapping and Land Information Sciences (M&LIS) Program also included within Geomatics Engineering.  A proposed new Spatial Information Science Program is currently under development, and this program will provide some new directions for geomatics at OSU.  Related programs at OSU, including the graduate program, are considered in the context of the Geomatics Engineering Program, The change from RAC to EAC accreditation is also discussed, especially the ABET 2000 requirements.

 

Improvements to the Penn State Surveying Program

Charles D. Ghilani, Francis W. Derby, and Thomas A. Seybert

 

During the past two years, the Penn State Surveying Program has advanced both curriculum and hardware/software combinations for its students.  This paper discusses the multi-faceted approach taken to improve retention and enhance the students’ academic experience.  Included in this discussion are the incorporation of GPS and field-to-finish software into the first-year courses; the development and use of remote sensing and softcopy photogrammetry software in a sequence of remote sensing, photogrammetry, and GIS courses; and the use of advanced instructional development tools in all courses.  This paper also presents new initiatives being made to expand recruitment of new students and increase enrollment.

 

The International Federation of Surveyors Commission Five: Positioning and Measurement

Robert W. Foster

 

This paper describes Commission Five (Positions and Measurement) of the International Federation of Surveyors (FIG).  The commission is defined and its primary areas of interest are described.  This is the sixth in a series of articles on the commissions of FIG.  In future issues of Surveying and Land Information Systems all commissions will be presented in a comprehensive discussion of their composition and goals, and the people who will achieve them.