By Lori Tarbett
Stephanie Shoobert’s “great sense of direction” led to her Carleton’s geography and environment studies department to pursue a geography degree with a minor in geomatics. Now, four years later, that same internal GIS technology has directed her to help execute Carleton’s 10th GIS Day on November 19, 2008.
GIS (Geographic Information Systems) technology was developed in Ottawa at Natural Resources Canada and has become so omnipresent it is celebrated annually around the world as part of Geography Awareness Week. Carleton’s GIS Day gives participants the opportunity to see how GIS technology is present in their everyday lives from better displaying of election results, to predicting disease outbreaks and ensuring your pizza is delivered on time.
Shoobert is the vice-president of the Carleton University Geographic Association. Last year, members of the association attended GIS Day to encourage awareness in geography, geomatics and GIS technology, but this year they are much more involved. The association has created a mini Geocaching game for attendees which includes a GPS unit, clues and an outdoor adventure. Geocaching is a high-tech GPS treasure hunt game played throughout the world by adventure seekers.
The fourth year undergraduate has also entered a map into the GIS Day mapping contest which will feature student map submissions. Additionally, she’ll be busy promoting the Find Your House display, which allows participants to bring home air photos of where they live using GIS Software, and she’ll be supporting the poster displays and general GIS Day setup.
Shoobert encourages all types of individuals, techno-savvy or not, to check out GIS Day: “I think GIS is a fun way to see and understand the world we live in and on. GIS allows any user to display visual data.”
She recommends attendees visit the Google Earth display and origami Globe folding.
GIS Day will be held in Porter Hall from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Visit http://www.library.carleton.ca/gis/gisday.html for more information.