SPACE - Sessions and Conference Workshops
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SPACE Sessions and Conference Workshops

This page provides information on presentations given at SPACE sponsored sessions and conference workshops.

American Sociological Association - 102nd Annual Meeting, August 11-14 2007
Minorities in Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Related Sciences (MANRRS), March 29-31, 2007
Thirteenth National HBCU Faculty Development Symposium, October 19 - 21, 2006
SFSU SPACE/UCGIS 2005 workshop presentation at the 2006 UCGIS Summer Assembly
Society for American Archaeology (SAA) 71st Annual Meeting, April 26 - 30, 2006
Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning Annual Conference, October 27-30, 2005
Instructional Demonstration Workshop at NTSSC, April 7, 2005
Panel Session at ASBS 70th Anniversary Meeting, March 11, 2005
UCGIS Winter Meeting, February 11, 2005

American Sociological Association -
102nd Annual Meeting
New York City, August 11-14 2007

Claudia Scholz, Research Programs Coordinator at Trinity University in San Antonio, has organized a panel session on Integrating Spatial Thinking into the Sociology Curriculum.

Panelists and summaries of their presentations follow:

Beyond the Field Trip: On Tourism as a Pedagogical Strategy
Shaul Kelner and George Sanders, Vanderbilt University

Many teachers incorporate field trips as a part of their curriculum. Even so, their potential to serve educational ends is probably underexploited due to insufficient consideration of the nature of field trips as a spatial practice. The sociology of tourism offers an empirically-grounded conceptual framework for thinking about the use of travel for pedagogical purposes. We will outline this framework and explore its practical implications drawing from our experience teaching a course that used tourism to teach the sociology of tourism. Note: This draft is being written as the class is beginning. It will be substantially revised to reflect the knowledge gained over the course of the Spring 2007 semester.

Spatial Sociopoly: Understanding the Role of Space in Inequality using "Monopoly" Board Game
Kishi Ducre, Syracuse University

After discovering Jessup's (2001) design of Sociopoly, I have used this simulation in my courses to demonstrate social inequality. Despite success in using Sociopoly, I have run into two challenges. First, there was a need to incorporate spatial dimensions of inequality. Another challenge was the lack of a local context in exploring stratification within the classroom. With these constraints in mind, I hoped to redesign Sociopoly in order for it to provide both a spatial, yet localized context for racial and class stratification in the city of Syracuse. The redesign focuses on two elements. The first is to provide a local context by incorporating the geographic and sociodemographic information of greater metropolitan area of Syracuse apply it to the layout of the Monopoly/Sociopoly board. The second design element was to revise the Jessup's rules of Sociopoly to reflect spatial processes, including the modeling of discriminatory mortgage lending, restrictive covenants, etc. This paper/presentation chronicles the two design elements needed to revise Sociopoly to meet the new challenges. The city of Syracuse will become the foundation of the revised edition, entitled Spatial Sociopoly. In its conclusion, I will offer some strategies for assessment and present the results of my first attempt at assessment in undergraduate courses on US racial residential segregation and urban sociology.

Teaching Residential Segregation in Undergraduate Classes Using Spatial Methods
Laurel Cornell, Indiana University

Teaching undergraduate students that residential segregation is created by social factors is difficult because many of them believe that having people of different socio-economic status live in different residential areas is ordinary and natural. Doing so requires that students recognize that residential segregation is an important social problem, understand its consequences, observe its existence, engage in the issue by relating it to their own lives, and employ their new knowledge to identify the same social problem in a different locality.
This paper evaluates the success of this process by assessing how students in an introductory class on urban issues at a large midwestern university responded to a series of exercises which asked them to map residential segregation by economic status first in their hometowns and then at the class research site. Students used the Census Bureau webpage to create maps of economic status, housing value, and presence of single mothers by block group or census tract in their hometowns, wrote essays on their findings, and answered exam questions related to their essays. They then did the same for the class research site in the local city.
Analysis of the data suggest that while mapping helped students to better observe residential segregation, observation alone did not necessarily lead them to believe that social forces rather than individual choices created it. Further refinement of this technique in later classes is necessary.

Race and Space: Crime, Joblessness and the American Apartheid
Karen Hayslett-McCall, University of Texas at Dallas

This lesson is designed for a graduate course in social stratification, with students coming from a wide variety of backgrounds and majors, usually including Applied Sociology, Criminology, Public Administration, and Political Economy. I bring to bear criminology, sociology, and geography/Geospatial Information Systems on the topic of "Race and Space." I introduce the Social Disorganization theory (Shaw and McKay, 1942), and draw a bullseye on the board in front of the students. I explain each of the zones and focus on the interstitial zone. Next, I bring maps to mind of old Chicago, where the "Chicago School" got started. Shaw and McKay clearly demonstrated that regardless of ethnicity, crime rates remained high in particular parts of Chicago � despite turnover. Thus, we begin to really discuss the concept of race. I explain that ethnicity in the early Chicago School was different, but we examine it in our modern time frame. I then turn the discussion to Dallas, TX. The students are familiar with the problems in parts of Dallas. We bring in all of our articles, one at a time � examining how these social phenomena are overrepresented in particular parts of Dallas. We talk about social policy. What can the police do? What should city managers do? The lecture always ends with the question of whether or not the situation, as it is in our community, can or will be changed. It is a terrifically interactive lesson and the students become very interested in space.

Integrating GIS Across Disciplines in a Liberal Arts College
Jeana Abromeit, Alverno College

I discuss strategies we are using at Alverno College, a liberal arts college for women, to integrate geographic information science across multiple disciplines. Course outcomes for an introductory, multi-disciplinary GIS course are also presented. Examples of assessments will be available to participants.


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Minorities in Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Related Sciences (MANRRS)
"22nd Annual Career Fair and Training Conference"
Birmingham Alabama, March 29-31, 2007

David A. Padgett, Associate Professor of Geography and Director of the Geographic Information Sciences Laboratory at Tennessee State University, will led a half-day workshop with the following objectives:

Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Global Positioning Systems (GPS), and Remote Sensing Applications in Support of Community and Urban Forestry

The workshop will expose MANRRS faculty and students to geospatial technologies and will encourage the incorporation of GIS in teaching. It will cover:

  • The background and methodology of three urban forestry projects developed by undergraduate students as Power Point presentations;
  • Live demonstrations of GIS software;
  • An outdoor tree inventory exercise to demonstrate the use of GPS receivers;.
  • Importing the inventory data into ArcGIS for display on a digital ortho quarter quadrangle;
  • Discussion of the results and procedures of the exercise; and
  • An overview of opportunities for training in GIS, acquisition of GIS software, and the development of GIS-based curriculum.

MANRRS is a national society that welcomes membership of all racial and ethnic groups to promote careers in agricultural and related sciences. Its annual career fair and training conference attracts hundreds of participants from academia, industry and government who are interested in diversity and in career opportunities for students and young professionals. The membership is multi-disciplinary, including representation from the agricultural and resource sciences, the social sciences, journalism, and business.

Presentation by David Padgett

Conference Report

For more information on MANRRS, see www.manrrs.org


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Thirteenth National HBCU Faculty Development Symposium
"Leading and Learning in an Age of Accountability"
Houston, Texas, October 19 - 21, 2006

Workshop on Geographic Information Systems and Spatial Analysis Methods in Social Sciences Teaching and Research

David A. Padgett, Associate Professor of Geography and Director of the Geographic Information Sciences Laboratory at Tennessee State University, led a half-day workshop with the following objectives:

  • to expose HBCU (Historically Black Colleges and Universities) faculty to innovative ways that geographic information systems (GIS), spatial analysis, and related technologies may be used to enhance social sciences teaching and research.
  • to provide HBCU faculty with information on how to obtain affordable GIS and spatial analysis software, and how and where to get training.
  • to demonstrate how students may directly benefit by adding GIS and spatial analysis applications to their professional skill sets.
  • to encourage those in attendance to attend GIS-related workshops, such as those sponsored by the Center for Spatially Integrated Social Science (CSISS) and the HBCU Faculty GIS Workshop
  • to invite those in attendance to join the HBCU GIS users online discussion group.

Presenters in the workshop included SPACE workshop participants (UCSB 2005):

  • Charles Barnes, Department of Political Science at North Carolina A&T State University
  • Laurie Garo, Department of Geography at University of North Carolina at Charlotte, and instructor at Johnson C. Smith University

The workshop featured several examples of class projects (see below) involving GIS applications in the social science and other disciplines and an interactive session in which attendees used spatial data from online sources and then mapped the data using GIS software. The workshop concluded with a question-and-answer session. An informational handout was distributed along with CSISS/SPACE materials. Partial support for this workshop was provided by the SPACE ACCESS.

The HBCU Faculty Development Network is an organization that serves 105 HBCUs. It promotes educational opportunities for underrepresented students, effective teaching and student learning, and collaborative activities for faculty enhancement. To learn more about its missions, goals, and objectives, see http://www.hbcufdn.org.


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SFSU SPACE/UCGIS 2005 workshop presentation at the 2006 UCGIS Summer Assembly

Instructors and participants in the SFSU SPACE/UCGIS 2005 workshop at San Francisco State University (SFSU) made a plenary presentation to the University Consortium for Geographic Information Science (UCGIS) Summer Assembly in Vancouver, Washington on July 29, 2006 describing the workshop. Delegates from 70 UCGIS member institutions, students, and others attended the presentation.

The presentation to the UCGIS Summer Assembly consisted of a description of the workshop by Richard LeGates (workshop PI and Professor of Urban Studies at SFSU) and XiaoHang Liu (workshop Co-PI and Assistant Professor of Geography at SFSU), a video that describes the workshop experience, presentations from three faculty workshop participants, and discussion.

LeGates and Liu reported that 19 faculty members and two graduate students participated in the six-day workshop. They came from universities across the country from departments of sociology, political science, geography, urban studies, and urban planning. Workshop activities consisted of about one-third lectures, one-third lab work, and one-third other activities, described in the following:

Jeana Abromeit (Professor of Sociology at Alverno College) described how she used workshop material to help create the college's first GIS course, establish a GIS lab, and create materials to integrate spatial thinking into Alverno's curriculum.

Chris Holoman (Associate professor of Political Science at Hilbert College) described his use of workshop material and a CSISS Instructional Development award to help create Hilbert's first two GIS courses, establish a GIS lab, expose every Hilbert student to basic spatial thinking concepts in a course that he teaches, and organize a one-day faculty development workshop on GIS and spatial thinking for Hilbert faculty.

Benjamin Forest (Associate professor of Geography, at McGill University) described an exercise he developed using material from Houston, Texas to teach Dartmouth University students about the politics of gerrymandering and how he will use information from the workshop and support from a CSISS Instructional Development award to develop a new module using ArcGIS' redistricting extension to teach McGill students about redistricting in Quebec city and simulate spatial consequences of sovereignty for Quebec.

For further information on the SFSU SPACE/UCGIS workshop
Visit: Visit: http://bss.sfsu.edu/nsfgis/workshop.htm
Or e-mail or

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Society for American Archaeology (SAA) 71st Annual Meeting
San Juan, Puerto Rico, April 26 - 30, 2006

2004 and 2005 SPACE workshop participants, Veronica Arias, Heather Richards, and Judith van der Elst (Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico), organized a symposium entitled Integrating Geospatial Perspectives and Education in Archaeology. The symposium is to be held at the 71st Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology (SAA) in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The SAA is an international organization that focuses on research, interpretation, and protection of cultural heritage resources in the Americas. The symposium is supported, in part, from the SPACE ACCESS program.

The objective of the symposium is to bring together archaeologists and other social scientists from varying fields, such as ethnology, geography, sociology, architectural and community planning, and others, who are currently applying geospatial analysis in their own research and who integrate geospatial concepts, technologies, and analysis into their teaching. Symposium participants include scholars from many disciplines, universities, and organizations.

The symposium will focus on pedagogical approaches, innovative teaching methodologies, instructional development, and dissemination of teaching strategies, and it will provide undergraduate students an opportunity to discuss their educational experiences and present their own geospatial research. In general, the symposium gives special attention to new teaching approaches that are more suited for teaching geospatial methods and techniques.

  • SAA Session Abstracts (22kb)

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    Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning Annual Conference
    Kansas City, Missouri, October 27-30, 2005

    Richard LeGates, Professor of Urban Studies at San Francisco State University, and coordinator of the 2005 SPACE workshop at SFSU, has organized a set of events related to curriculum development for the annual meeting of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning - the national organization of universities teaching urban and regional planning. The objective is to encourage greater use of spatial concepts in planning courses and to introduce resources and tools to make this possible. The following sessions are supported, in part, from the SPACE ACCESS program.

    • Integrating GIS and Spatial Analysis into the Undergraduate Planning Curriculum
    • A Roundtable introduced teaching materials developed by the panelists and reviewed open source software appropriate for teaching spatial concepts to students of urban planning.
    • Drop-in Workshops, equipped with laptop computers, will permit meeting attendees to review demonstrations of GIS instructional modules for ArcGIS software, and to experiment with open source software for spatial analysis (GeoDa, FlowMapper, and STARS).
    • Abstract and Agenda (12kb)
    • Session Report (7kb)

    In addition to LeGates, other participants in this program included Ayse Pamuk, Associate Professor of Urban Studies at SFSU; Brian Paar, Workbook project manager for ESRI Virtual Campus; and Stuart Sweeney, Assistant Professor, Department of Geography, U.C. Santa Barbara, and Coordinator of the 2004 and 2005 UCSB SPACE summer workshops.


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    Instructional Demonstration Workshop at NTSSC, Las Vegas, NV, April 7, 2005

    2004 SPACE workshop participant, David Padgett, organized a workshop session for the National Technology and Social Science Conference (NTSSC) in Las Vegas, Nevada. The session received support from the SPACE ACCESS program.

    The NTSSC membership includes history, geography, education, economics, psychology, anthropology, sociology, ethnic studies, women's studies, interdisciplinary studies, political science, and other related studies.


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    Panel Session at ASBS 70th Anniversary Meeting, Nashville, TN, March 11, 2005

    2004 SPACE workshop participants, David Padgett and Nikitah Imani, organized a Panel Session for the 70th Anniversary Annual Meeting of the Association of Social and Behavioral Scientists (ASBS), in Nashville, TN. The panel session received support from the SPACE ACCESS Program (Academic Conference Courses to Enhancement in Spatial Science).

    The ASBS is comprised of "social and behavioral scientists and other professionals whose research has implications for improving national status and societal conditions." The membership is drawn primarily from academics representing Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), spanning a broad range of disciplines in the social and behavioral sciences.


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    UCGIS Winter Meeting, Washington, D.C., February 11, 2005

    The University Consortium for Geographic Information Science (UCGIS) is a collaborating partner in the SPACE program and is responsible for offering one of the program's three annual workshops. A feature of the UCGIS workshop is that participants may be invited to give presentations and to participate in mini-workshop sessions in conjunction with the UCGIS Assemblies and Meetings. Some of the results of the 2004 SPACE workshop at San Diego State University were showcased at the UCGIS Winter Meeting.


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