URISA members—Are you interested in giving back to the community or repaying the generosity of mentors and teachers? How about helping to break down the digital divide that separates communities and hemispheres?

GeoCorps is an emerging idea. The premise is to form a volunteer-based GIS professional group with the goal of providing short-term GIS expertise to underdeveloped countries and communities around the world. Although assistance may be offered in the United States and Canada, the focus is on communities in other countries.

GeoCorps would be a volunteer-based, nonprofit organization of GIS professionals committed to assisting developing countries and communities with their GIS needs and services. GeoCorps would match the host countries' GIS needs with the expertise of its member volunteers.

The host country's GIS needs would be determined by evaluating their spatial data sets (if any) and various applications supportable by those data sets.

If you are interested in learning more about GeoCorps or would like to volunteer, visit www.urisa.org/geocorps/geocorps.htm.