Thursday, December 25, 2003 TODAY
School of Public Health news
School of Public Health promotes awareness on GIS
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| Seth Wiafe, MPH student, educates visiting children from local schools about geographic information systems (GIS). |
GIS Day brought children and adults alike to explore the
technology of geographic information systems (GIS) on November 19. GIS
Day is a global event for thousands of users of GIS to educate the public
and demonstrate GIS technology at schools and organizations around the
world. LLU School of Public Health held the event in their new geoinformatics
lab that opened the same day.
“The goal of GIS Day is to help educate children as well as adults on the
applications of geography and computer-aided mapping,” states Seth Wiafe,
MPH student and organizer of the event.
GIS Day is part of the activities marking Geography Awareness Week sponsored
by the National Geographic Society since 1987. GIS represents computer software,
data, and solutions that are used by thousands of people worldwide in government,
education, and business. One common example of how many people use GIS is getting
driving directions and maps on the Internet.
“We had about 125 elementary students from San Bernardino, Loma Linda,
and Grand Terrace attend GIS Day,” says Samuel Soret, PhD, assistant professor,
environment/occupational health, SPH, and organizer of the event. “In addition,
we had numerous visitors from various entities on campus.”
The sponsors of GIS Day event include the National Geographic Society, American
Association of Geographers, University Consortium for Geographic Information
Science, the Library of Congress, the U. S. Geological Survey, Sun Microsystems,
Hewlett-Packard, and Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI).
LLU School of Public Health is the only school in the nation to offer a bachelor
of science of public health in health geographics. The School recently added
a certificate in health geoinformatics as well as a new location to learn. “The
geoinformatics lab will be used for teaching, research, and to meet the growing
GIS needs campus wide,” explains Mr. Wiafe.
Two classes in health geoinformatics will be offered winter quarter: Priniciples
of GIS & science and Cartography & map design. For more information regarding
health geoinformatics at LLU, you may visit the website at <www.llu.edu/llu/sph/geoinformatics.htm>.
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Thursday, December 25, 2003 TODAY
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