{"id":521072,"date":"2022-06-28T19:59:32","date_gmt":"2022-06-29T02:59:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/about\/newsroom\/?post_type=arcnews&p=521072"},"modified":"2022-06-28T11:30:57","modified_gmt":"2022-06-28T18:30:57","slug":"working-together-to-create-beautiful-science","status":"publish","type":"arcnews","link":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/about\/newsroom\/arcnews\/working-together-to-create-beautiful-science","title":{"rendered":"Working Together to Create Beautiful Science"},"author":5752,"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"sync_status":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","castos_file_data":"","podmotor_file_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1041,171,10372],"tags":[301,18442,241,138062,276982],"arcnews_issues":[479682],"class_list":["post-521072","arcnews","type-arcnews","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-collaboration","category-education","category-gis-hero","tag-community","tag-data-collection","tag-gis","tag-science","tag-storytelling","arcnews_issues-summer-2022","arcnews_sections-gis-people"],"acf":{"short_description":"Professor Tim Hawthorne collaborates with students, teachers, and local residents around the world to bring the power of community to GIS.","pdf":{"host_remotely":false,"file":"","file_url":""},"flexible_content":[{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"

Imaginative Professor Brings the Power of Community to GIS<\/h2>\r\nWhen the GeoBus pulls up to a school, the driver turns off the diesel engine, flips a switch, and the former city bus\u2014now expertly painted with geography scenes and equipped with workstations rather than seats\u2014becomes a solar-powered geospatial learning lab.\r\n\r\n\u201cFrom there, an entire class of students works in small groups of three or four through a variety of learning stations, spending 20\u201330 minutes on each activity. And what they\u2019re doing is they\u2019re being introduced to different geospatial technologies,\u201d said Dr. Timothy Hawthorne, associate professor of GIS in the sociology department at the University of Central Florida (UCF) and the founder of the GeoBus."},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image":519322,"image_position":"right","orientation":"vertical","hyperlink":""},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"There\u2019s a 55-inch touch screen whiteboard that students use to visualize geospatial data in ArcGIS Online. They put on virtual reality goggles to take simulated trips around the world. There\u2019s an augmented reality sandbox where students learn about topography, elevation, and contours. Three-dimensional, printed landscape models show the kids different terrains, from low-lying valleys to mountains and deserts. Laminated topographic maps from the United States Geological Survey and National Geographic familiarize them with basic wayfinding. Students also work with coding robots, learn to fly mini drones, and gather data on renewable and nonrenewable energy resources around their campuses using ArcGIS data collection apps and Bluetooth GPS receivers.\r\n\r\n\u201cIt\u2019s all about getting them excited about the technology and working as a team,\u201d said Hawthorne, who, as a community-based researcher and public scholar, seeks to make GIS more inclusive of and engaging to a wider audience beyond the university setting. \u201cThe kids also get to meet UCF students, staff, and faculty so we can show them that there\u2019s a possible major for them here and a host of career paths.\u201d\r\n\r\nHawthorne thought of building a mobile GIS education lab almost 10 years ago, when he was an assistant professor of geography at Georgia State University and the state coordinator and director of research at the Georgia Geographic Alliance.\r\n\r\n\u201cEvery state had one of these organizations at the time, and the idea was to connect K\u201312 educators and the broader education community with each other to build geospatial and geography learning opportunities,\u201d he explained. \u201cWe did a lot of outreach where I would pack up my Prius or a colleague\u2019s car and we would take everything we could to a school and set up shop for an afternoon. And I just thought, there has to be a better way\u2014something bigger we can do.\u201d\r\n\r\nThat\u2019s when Hawthorne got the idea for a \u201cgeobus.\u201d He couldn\u2019t find anything like that in the United States, but he did find Columbia University\u2019s BioBus, a mobile science lab that serves young people in New York City. So he connected with the team there and met with others in the mobile lab community to get ideas for how to build his bus. All this came together around the time he moved to UCF, however, so momentum waned for a while.\r\n\r\nIn the interim, Hawthorne\u2014true to form, it turns out\u2014worked on a lot of other, concomitant projects.\r\n\r\n\u201cHe\u2019s a big-idea guy, and he always follows through with those big ideas,\u201d said Dr. Lain Graham, a senior solution engineer for the national government sciences team at Esri.\r\n\r\nHawthorne was Graham\u2019s instructor when, as a graduate student at Georgia State, she took his study-abroad GIS course in Belize. He also advised her in her PhD studies at UCF. And now, Graham helps Hawthorne lead the undergraduate version of that research trip to the Central American country."},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image":519332,"image_position":"left","orientation":"horizontal","hyperlink":""},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"\u201cIt takes a big team to execute those ideas, and Tim recognizes that,\u201d she continued. \u201cHe\u2019s a very strong, collaborative leader, and he elevates people by enhancing their passions and augmenting those with additional skills.\u201d\r\n\r\n\u201cI seek out projects where I might be strong in one thing and somebody else is strong in something else, and we come together to create really beautiful science,\u201d Hawthorne affirmed.\r\n\r\nOutside the classroom, Hawthorne does this through Citizen Science GIS, the research organization he founded that serves as an umbrella for various projects\u2014many of which operate on grants from the National Science Foundation. These include, among other ventures, the GeoBus; the research trips to Belize; a program with the Smithsonian Institution that\u2019s using drones to map eelgrass in the Pacific Northwest; and a project to help a water utility in Orlando, Florida, map its infrastructure.\r\n\r\nFor all these projects, Hawthorne makes sure \u201cthe work is authentically grounded in community,\u201d he said, and that local residents and stakeholders are an integral part of the research process.\r\n\r\n\u201cTim has changed the narrative in this respect and has challenged some of the more traditional approaches to doing GIS to make them more inclusive,\u201d said Graham. \u201cHe involves local knowledge in data collection and provides space to include unstructured, qualitative data in the research. The importance of diversity and inclusion is something that Tim is very aware of and uncompromising on.\u201d\r\n\r\nIn Belize, for example, Hawthorne and his teams have worked with local fishermen, tour guides, and boat captains to map coastal and reef environments. Community members\u2019 knowledge is prioritized in the research, and their stories are augmented with quantitative data that researchers gather with drones and data collection apps.\r\n\r\n\u201cTim is very careful to let us researchers know what our roles and responsibilities are on these projects,\u201d explained Graham. \u201cWe are not the experts on the issues. We are there to collect data.\u201d\r\n\r\nHawthorne wants his students and research teams to recognize how the data they\u2019re gathering impacts communities and how those communities are part of the data.\r\n\r\n\u201cData is incomplete when you talk about a community but you don\u2019t actually work with that community. That leads to more inequality. That leads to lack of access and representation,\u201d said Hawthorne. \u201cWhat our work is really about is bringing those voices in and ensuring that the data is representative of those communities and that their stories are being put at the same level as some of the other, more authoritative data sources that you might normally find in GIS.\u201d\r\n\r\nWhen Hawthorne goes to Belize, he asks community members for permission to work in the area, whether they want to join the data collection team, and what questions the research team should be asking. When he works with kids on the GeoBus, he gives them the tools they need to do bona fide citizen science, like finding gaps in renewable energy sources on campus so they can encourage their teachers, principals, and school districts to make improvements.\r\n\r\n\u201cI would give this all up if I didn\u2019t feel that it was moving other people\u2019s lives forward,\u201d Hawthorne said in a nod to one of his own mentors, Dr. John Krygier, professor of environment and sustainability at Ohio Wesleyan University."},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image":519342,"image_position":"right","orientation":"horizontal","hyperlink":""},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"Krygier\u2019s class on the power of maps\u2014which Hawthorne only took because it fit into his golf practice schedule\u2014was the young college student\u2019s introduction to geography.\r\n\r\n\u201cIt completely blew me away,\u201d Hawthorne recalled. \u201cI learned how expansive geography was, and John\u2014who is still a mentor and good friend of mine\u2014was that professor who got me energized about the subject.\u201d\r\n\r\nHawthorne took another class with Krygier and ended up with a funded summer research project mapping recreational trails in Delaware County, Ohio.\r\n\r\n\u201cI not only learned GIS, but I also learned how to do interviews with community members,\u201d he said. \u201cThat was foundational for me because it showed that it wasn\u2019t just about the technology; it was about engaging people with the technology and connecting people with society. All that came from John Krygier.\u201d\r\n\r\nHawthorne, who is currently a 2022 National Geographic Explorer, said that, above all, he wants to be a good mentor.\r\n\r\n\u201cAnytime I can provide someone with the opportunity to work on something that they\u2019re excited about, that really drives me,\u201d he said.\r\n\r\nAnd that drove him to finish the GeoBus project earlier this year. After procuring a bus and getting UCF students to help spruce it up, Hawthorne\u2019s GeoBus dream became a reality in February. With the $30,000 grant that he received from being a National Geographic Explorer, Hawthorne and his team of \u201cGeoBus drivers of change\u201d hope that, by making two to three visits per week to schools around Florida, they can reach 10,000 K\u201312 students this year.\r\n\r\n\u201cLet\u2019s build the next generation of people in science!\u201d Hawthorne exclaimed."},{"acf_fc_layout":"sidebar","layout":"standard","image_reference":null,"image_reference_figure":"","spotlight_image":null,"section_title":"","spotlight_name":"","position":"Center","content":"Read other articles in the GIS Heroes<\/a> series.","snippet":""}],"references":null},"yoast_head":"\nWorking Together to Create Beautiful Science | ArcNews | Summer 2022<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Professor Tim Hawthorne collaborates with students, teachers, and local residents around the world to bring the power of community to GIS.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, 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