IF proposal

Managing Spatial Information on ACS Campuses

A Proposal for Funding under the Information Fluency Initiative

Hugh Blackmer
Washington & Lee University
November 2001

Introduction

This proposal seeks support for the next step in ACS's development of fluency with spatial information, and connects work I have been doing for many years (see Activities and Links, below) with needs articulated during a meeting of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) users from six ACS campuses at University of Richmond in early November. We came to a consensus that the greatest common need is for improved access to spatial information: teachers and students need to know what datasets and images are available locally, what can be accessed from remote storage, and how data can be converted to useable formats. Each ACS campus needs to develop GIS support and spatial data collections that address local teaching and research needs, and most users also need help in making effective use of spatial information.

These are all issues of Information Fluency, and address the full gamut of concerns of the ACS Initiative: end users must develop research skills across a growing range of information media, institutions must build collections to support the evolving needs of teaching and learning, and library and computing staff must create the infrastructure for delivery of effective and timely logistical support and training. While the primary goal of an Information Fluency Initiative on a campus is to support the needs of local departments and programs, ACS objectives also include (1) encouraging implementation of 'best practises' on other campuses, (2) developing collaborations among ACS members, and (3) sharing resources and facilitating exchanges where feasible. This proposal addresses all of these goals and purposes, and seeks support for creation of a prototype of management software which will enable development of spatial data libraries on ACS campuses.

At the Richmond meeting we discovered that Sewanee and Washington & Lee have been pursuing complementary approaches to GIS development:

The Landscape Analysis Lab at Sewanee (under the direction of Jon Evans) combines a focused and externally funded research program with a GIS teaching environment. Support personnel have practical knowledge of a broad spectrum of GIS products and have learned a great deal about data management and solving day-to-day problems. Summer workshops have built basic skills and established an effective training model.
At Washington & Lee a collaboration between a librarian (Hugh Blackmer), the Director of the Media Center (John Blackburn), and a database and networking specialist (Skip Williams) has focused on Internet Map Server (ArcIMS) development, centered on Web-based map interfaces to interconnected data realms (image archives, bibliographic records), distribution of interactive maps to classroom and community, and support for campus internationalization. This effort also draws on the skills of senior Computer Science students, whose capstone projects can be linked to the development effort.

Much can be gained from linkage of these efforts, and this proposal seeks funding for travel for working visits of 3-4 days, to facilitate exchange between campuses.

Ultimately we seek to build a distributable spatial library, including data, management tools, and supporting documentation which can be brought to a campus information environment (computing facilities and library) and integrated with existing systems, personnel, and curricular objectives. The Richmond meeting (under the leadership of Pat Schoknecht) recognized that creation of components of this spatial library will be a multi-stage effort, for which external funding will be sought. In the interim, and to support development of the grant proposal, we at Washington & Lee propose to continue to work on prototypes of system modules, in consultation with people from several ACS schools. Site visits will broaden our knowledge of existing resources, complementary skills, and specific problems, and will establish the basis for future collaboration with GIS users on several campuses (initially, Davidson, Furman and Richmond, in addition to Sewanee; others interested in participation could be added).

GIS as an Information Fluency issue

The faculty or student user of GIS software has the same basic Fluency problem as a user of traditional print or emerging electronic media, which can be summarized in the question what do you have and how can I get it? The Web offers a distributed environment within which this question can be answered in many ways (including online catalogs, search engines, indexes, full text delivery and virtual reference services, guides and tutorials, and browsable archives). Virtual libraries of georeferenced data have recently joined this spectrum of information resources, and every campus with GIS activities has the problem of proliferating spatial data: users seek data and create maps, and in the absence of someone to organize and manage this maelstrom, local servers accumulate vast quantities of unconnected projects and files. Few libraries have integrated spatial information into their services, but advertisements for 'spatial librarians' are beginning to appear, and a number of developmental efforts are reaching maturity.

Some spatial data are needed by all institutions (such as global and national base maps and census data), but most campuses also require local data in various formats (topographic maps, TIGER files, remote sensing imagery), and researchers need to store and distribute project-specific data. End users must often wrestle with unfamiliar data formats, projections, and conversion software.

GIS has appeared on ACS campuses in some departments (Geology at Trinity, Centenary and Washington & Lee; Biology at Davidson; Anthropology at Centre; Politics at Washington & Lee) and programs (Environmental Studies at Rhodes, Furman and Sewanee), but spread to other settings awaits improved support for users. Few ACS institutions are likely to fund GIS support personnel until their absolute necessity is clear, libraries are unprepared to take on management and distribution of spatial data, and few faculty will invest time and energy in learning and using GIS without institutional support. Breaking this logjam requires an innovative model of support and distribution.

While the present proposal covers only prototype development during the next 6-8 months, a more detailed sketch of our developing vision for the fuller system will clarify the directions we contemplate. Refinements and elaboration (which will feed into the application for external funding) will come both from discussions we have with other ACS participants and from convergent developments in the GIS industry.

We seek to build a spatial information infrastructure that (1) end users can navigate easily, (2) librarians can use and maintain without special skills, (3) faculty can draw upon to augment and distribute course material, (4) institutions can build upon for outreach to surrounding communities, (5) will support the work of GIS support staff as institutions add them, and (6) will stimulate collaborations among ACS partners. The elements include:

GIS servers: we envision eventual implementation of ArcIMS servers at all participating institutions, to handle on-campus distribution of frequently used data and wider distribution of local contributions; initially development would be centralized on one or two main servers for the consortium
Data structure and access: design and implementation of common standards for on-campus and external access to archived spatial data
Metadata tools: utilities for online entry of identification and cataloging information for material being added to collections, complying with Dublin Core and NSDT [?] conventions to facilitate incorporation in online catalogs
Converters: a suite of tools to transform spatial data into common formats for easy use by end users
Online tutorials: step-by-step instructions for common problems
Construction kits: utilities to facilitate linkage of data and the creation of interactive maps for Web distribution
The Digital South: a distributed library of georeferenced data covering the states in which ACS institutions are located, including maps, images, text (and potentially other media, including sound and video), with local collections housed on servers on the various campuses and reflecting local interests. This archive will grow as institutions add resources and pursue research on surrounding regions.
Subsequent developments may include
SQL calls to Online Catalogs:
ArcSDE: ESRI's Spatial Database Engine, in conjunction with SQL Server, may prove to be an effective data storage and retrieval method

Budget

Funds for travel by automobile, to facilitate exchange between campuses, in the form of working visits of 3-4 days.

initial visit to Sewanee, with stops at Davidson and Furman on return, for Skip Williams and myself (motel $80/night/person = $640; food $40/day/person = $320; 1000 miles @ $.32/mile = $320. TOTAL: $1280)
visit by 2 from Sewanee to W&L, including a day at University of Richmond and stops at Davidson and Furman. TOTAL: $1280
grant proposal development: travel between Richmond and Washington & Lee $80 per round trip, 3 trips TOTAL: $240

GRAND TOTAL: $2800

Activities to date and links to further detail

My involvement with GIS began more than 20 years ago with SYMAP (a line-printer mapping utility) and continued in the microcomputer environment with AutoCAD. In 1998 I received an ACS grant to purchase a library license for ArcView, and subsequently Washington & Lee got a site license for ArcView. I attended the GIS Boot Camp (funded by the Environmental Studies Program of ACS) at Trinity in August 1999, following which many institutions acquired ESRI's ArcView GIS software, either in site license or lab pack form. John Blackburn and I developed a part of the ACS-funded Miley graphics server as a central location for campus support for GIS data and online tutorials, and we also worked on a proposal for an ACS-wide GIS server (The Digital South) in the fall of 1999. In an effort to develop a collaborative basis for infrastructural support within ACS, in Winter 2000 I wrote (in consultation with Bob Whyte) an unsuccessful application for FIPSE funding. Some of the ideas in that proposal led to experiments with GIS support at Washington & Lee, and I have continued to explore GIS possibilities in a variety of locations and disciplinary settings, including my own courses in Anthropology of East Asia and Human Geography. In the last two years I have had opportunities to attend several GIS conferences (San Bernardino 2000, and I have visited ESRI and a number of institutions in California with active spatial information programs (February 2000 and February 2001). I have also served as a GIS development consultant to University of Richmond. ESRI's gift to Washington & Lee of ArcIMS software led to a project with Washington & Lee colleagues to distribute spatial information via the Web, the current state of which we introduced at the recent meeting in Richmond.

Some documents that summarize my thinking and activities at specific times:

GIS in midsummer 2001 (a general summary, including a report of my attendance at ESRI's User Conference)
What we need to do in planning and carrying out the next phase of GIS development (end of June 2001)

Some resources for University of Richmond visit, 25 May 2001

Building a Digital Library of Spatial Data and Images for Rockbridge County (April 2001)
GIS in Undergraduate Teaching (Dec 2000 summary)
GIS Across the Curriculum (LAAP PreProposal, March 2000)
GIS: an insurmountable opportunity? (November 1999)
Information Fluency writings, 1999-2001