Draft Minutes of the Board of UCGIS Council Meetings

June 22, 2000

8:30am-9:00am

Welches, Oregon

  1. Admission of new members: Carolyn Merry proposed two new members: Florida State University and Arizona State University. Both were voted in unanimously.

 

June 24, 2000

9:00am-12:00 noon

Welches, Oregon

  1. Adoption of the minutes of February 7, 2000 was approved.
  2. Bill Huxhold presented the Executive Report.
    1. Membership: UCGIS membership stands at 74 member institutions: 59 regular academic members, 4 multiple campus members, 6 affiliate members, 4 professional societies, and one government affiliate.
    2. Grants: University of Wyoming has completed a $21,000 grant for metadata training. There are several current grants from UCGIS to member universities in progress totally over $200,000. UCGIS has an RFP outstanding with HUD on urban indicators research.
    3. Workshops: UCGIS and USGS will host two meeting on GIScience and vector-borne disease. DOT/BTS are developing a long-range strategic plan on GIS to include workshops. They are interested in working with UCGIS to develop the workshops. Interested members were asked to contact Harvey Miller at University of Utah to express interest.
  1. AGILE conference, May 25-27 2000, Helsinki, Finland: Attended by Greg Elmes as UCGIS representative. UCGIS is developing a proposal to NSF to host a joint AGILE/UCGIS meeting. The topic of the first meeting will be "Specialists in GI and Society". Grant request is for $25,000 with a matching amount coming from European NSF.
  2. Winter meeting report was presented by Harlan Onsrud. The meeting was a success. UCGIS members participated in a federal agency briefing. Representatives from six agencies spoke on research grant opportunities within their agencies. UCGIS sponsored an application competition among its members, and six member institutions presented GIScience application papers to congressional representatives and staff. UCGIS also sponsored a reception where 30 of our members highlighted their GIScience education and research.
  3. Financial report: Jampoler gave the financial report for Abler. The organization completed its second voluntary audit in two years. UCGIS financial position continues to be strong. Egenhofer moved and Richard Wright seconded a motion to accept the report. Motion approved.
  4. Committee reports:
    1. Policy and Legislation: The Winter meeting was very successful. The committee will be working on the next meeting in Washington DC in early February. UCGIS will sponsor a congressional breakfast, and GIScience showcase.
    2. Research: The Research Committee reported on the Summer Assembly.
    1. The student competition was successful this year. UCGIS received 42 abstracts from 30 universities. Two awards were made for best papers, and one award was made for best poster. At the next Summer Assembly, the Committee is considering adding tracks for students that would include how to pursue an academic position and publication issues. The committee needs a volunteer to head the student program. A student member will be on the committee for developing the student program.

      2.  

    2. Emerging Themes in GIScience Plenary. For the Summer Assembly, UCGIS solicited papers from individual members. Presentations were given on June 22:

A robust discussion followed each presentation about the validity of the topic as a separate theme. A straw poll on the topics will be taken under the Discussion of Emerging Research Themes portion of the Assembly (see below).

The next step in the process is to develop white papers for each topic and present them at the next Assembly. Usery stressed the need for volunteers to work on the white papers.
    1. 1999 White papers. White papers developed from the 1999 Summer Assembly were published as the Spring 2000 edition of the URISA, Volume 12, No 2, edited by Greg Elmes and Richard Wright.
    2. Robert McMaster has all but three chapters of the book developed from the 1998 Summer Assembly in Park City, Utah. An introductory chapter is also needed. UCGIS members interested in participating should contact Bob McMaster.
    3. Upcoming meetings: GIScience 2000, October 28-31, Savannah, Georgia. UCGIS is a co-sponsor of the meeting with AAG and NCGIS. Meeting will offer 7 keynote speakers, 117 papers. Program available at www.GISCINEC.org.
    1. Education
    1. Suggested that a sub-committee be formed to examine the role of UCGIS in GIS Day and identify alternatives to broaden the constituency.
    2. Education Conferences: Members suggested that the Committee look into organizing a GIScience education program for the next Summer Assembly.
    3. A list of possible topics and volunteers will be prepared to write columns in the Directions Electronic Magazine
    4. Intergraph and Smallworld both offered to support the cost of a meeting of the GIScience Model Curriculum Working group to assist the group in the preparation of a proposal for funding the curriculum development.
    5. Procedures for identifying outstanding GIScience educators were discussed in the Education Committee meeting.
    6. The Educational Plenary included GIS and Distance Learning and GIScience Certification and Accreditation. The Distance learning presentations and panel discussions included Cherri Pancake, Cathleen Lueue, Frank Gossette, Mike Phoenix and Dawn Wright. The Certification panel consisted of Bill Huxhold, Jim Plasker, and David Cowen.
    7. The Council agreed to establish an ad hoc sub-committee that will produce a white paper on distance learning. Dawn Wright was named Chair of the committee.
    8. The Council passed a motion that "UCGIS should take an active role in defining skills that should be taught to professional GIS specialists".
    9. The Education Committee is considering the establishment of an Outstanding GIScience Educator Award. The committee is drafting the criteria for the award, and plans to make an award at the 2001 Summer Assembly.
    1. Membership
    1. Two new members were elected to UCGIS.
    2. A total of 30 members are up for the five-year renewal. Eight have completed their renewal. The other 22 must complete their web update by December 31, 2000.
    1. Dawn Wright discussed the various UCGIS lists. Members can subscribe and unsubscribe themselves. All email messages to each list are archived, and members of the list can review historic emails.
    1. Communications
    1. A brief report on the list servers available to UCGIS members was presented.
    2. Members should contact Suzy Jampoler with delegate changes.
    1. Research Projects
    1. Grants completed in 1999: University of Wyoming
    2. Current grants:

SUNY Buffalo $45,000

Oregon State University $63,000

Framework Survey $90,000

U of Kentucky

Rutgers University

U. Wisconsin-Madison
  1. UCGIS non-discrimination policy Onsrud moved and Richard Wright seconded the following motion:

    2. The mission of UCGIS is to serve as a unified and effective voice for the geographic information science research community, foster multidisciplinary research and education in geographic information science, and promote the informed and responsible use of geographic information systems and geographic analysis for the benefit of society.

    In furtherance of this mission, UCGIS shall endorse or co-sponsor only those activities of others that are germane to the goals of UCGIS and that support full and open exchange of scholarly ideas in an unbiased manner. Activities that limit or constrain participation solely on the basis of affiliation with a private, academic, or government entity or on the basis of gender, race, sexual orientation or religious affiliation are deemed in violation of this policy.

    Motion approved.

  2. Discussion and acceptance of emerging research themes.

    3. A straw vote on emerging research themes was taken. The results were:

    Public participation in GIS Yes 45 No 12

    Geospatial data mining Yes 56 No 3

    Ontological issues in GIS Yes 49 No 7

    Social construction of GIS and GIScience Yes 22 No 35

    Visualization Yes 54 No 3

    Analytical cartography Yes 33 No 25

    Innovation. & integration for remotely acquired information Yes 45 No 14

  3. Format of future meetings
    1. The Winter Meeting will be held in Washington DC in February 2001. A UCGIS will sponsor a Congressional Breakfast and demonstration of GIScience research and education projects, as well as host a meeting for federal agencies to discuss possible research grant opportunities.
    2. The Summer Assembly will be held in Buffalo, NY in June 2001. A web site, http://www.geog.buffalo.edu/ucgis/UCGIS2001.html, describes the events.
    3. The Summer Assembly in 2001 will be sponsored by the University of Georgia.

9. Meeting adjourned, noon, Saturday June 24, 2000.