Spatial Data Management Group Meeting Notes November 18, 2004

Basically this meeting was a chance to reflect on GIS Day 2004.

Good Things

Overall, everyone felt it was a success. The teachers were good, the students were engaged, great age group. The weather cooperated, and the lunch time went good. In the small groups, some people felt that it was great to do the program they had done the previous year, as it was pretty easy. The transition from room to room in Richardson First Floor went smoothly as we weren't trying to move them within each room (just from room to room). It didn't feel like we had twice the number of students.

Things that didn't go so great

Time in labs and small group demos was too short. Labs could use 45 min to 1 hour, small groups could use a good 15 minutes (although 15 minutes is a long time in the poster session).

Number of students in lab at one time can be difficult, especially with lots of teachers/parents. More helpers could help (perhaps get undergrads involved).

Need time to reset computers between groups.

Coordination was tough for this size of a group on the GPS walk.

Don't ask for city GPS truck as it usually isn't there. Don't try to coordinate with other events on GPS walk, too complicated.

We had a couple of difficult transitions. Main problem was keeping the kids from walking through FSL. Need to have better communication.

Need to keep kids involved in GPS walk after they've done their point.

Need to get more forestry students and staff involved.

Didn't arrange for set-up and take-down.

LaSelles was a bad idea. Too far off campus, not enough publicity on Dawns talk.

Have students keep their backpacks at home (teachers can cart boxes of lunches)

Bathrooms around lunch was difficult

Ideas for Next Year

Lunch at Marketplace West (can reserve an area)

Do keynote in Richardson 107 or reserve another hall on campus.

Get feedback from teachers.

Get Keith to do something!

Have a treasure hunt or puzzle to solve as they pick up clues along the GPS walk. This will keep the kids engaged.

Other Items

Matt Gregory shared a site for viewing the world and up close: worldwind This could be a small group demo next year at GIS Day.
David Hockman-Wert is having a problem with saving .mxd files on the network drives (won't over-write). People in the research forests are having the same problem. Most of us don't save to network drives, so we're not sure if we're having the problem here or not.