SFA to host GIS speaker series

Leann Wheeler, GIS specialist of CDM-Smith Dallas, and P.R. Blackwell, director of SFA's Columbia Regional Geospatial Service Center

NACOGDOCHES, Texas-In honor of Geography Awareness Week and National GIS Day, Stephen F. Austin State University will host "Discovering the World through GIS," a speaker series featuring information about Geographic Information Systems applications and careers.

Leann Wheeler, GIS specialist of CDM-Smith Dallas, will present "GIS and Remote Sensing" at 1 p.m. Monday, Nov. 12, in the Ferguson Building, Room 478, on the SFA campus. Later that day, Wheeler also will present "GIS Careers" at 5 p.m. in the Forestry Building, Room 117.

Wheeler has more than 20 years of GIS experience throughout the country in industries such as power and energy, mass transit, and aviation. She serves as chapter president for the North Central Texas Geospatial Information Technology Association and is a member of the curriculum development and leadership academy committees for the Urban and Regional Information Systems Association.

At 9 a.m. Wednesday, Nov. 14, P.R. Blackwell, director of the Columbia Regional Geospatial Service Center at SFA, will present "Crowds and Clouds - The Future of Geospatial Technology" in the Forestry Building, Room 117.

For 25 years, Blackwell has been involved with geospatial and information technologies at SFA, where he designed, built, maintained and operated sophisticated computer systems for the Tucker Center for GIS Applications and Training. He also designed and implemented a geospatial laboratory for Northeast Forestry University in Harbin, China. Blackwell served as founding chairman of the board of directors for AmericaView, Inc and is the director of the TexasView Remote Sensing Consortium.

Geography Awareness Week, held the third week of November, is an awareness program that highlights the importance of geo-literacy and geo-education. National GIS Day will be held Wednesday, Nov. 14, and celebrates geospatial technology. The speaker series is sponsored by the College of Liberal and Applied Arts and the Arthur Temple College of Forestry and Agriculture, and the speaking events are free and open to the public. For more information, or for those interested in geography or spatial science majors, call Dr. Darrel McDonald at (936) 468- 2330 or Dr. I-Kuai Hung at (936) 468-2464.