[00:00:00.

090] - Speaker 1
Hello, everybody, and welcome to another geospatial webinar sponsored by Directions magazine. Today
we're offering a special roundtable on the topic of what you need to know before furthering your
education. Hi, my name is Nora Parker, the senior webinar producer at Directions Magazine, and I'll be
your moderator for today's webinar. And I'm assisted by my colleague Barbara Ashduke, who will be able
to assist you with any questions you have via the questions in Face. Today we have a terrific panel of
educators lined up. Dr. Anthony Robinson from Penn State, dr. Devin Consilla from American Sentinel
University, dr. Cordula Robinson from Northeastern University, steve Hick from Denver University, and
Dr. Rich Schultz from Elmhurst College. So we're going to get to our second poll, and it is which of the
following would you consider obstacles to furthering your education online? And I'm going to go ahead
and launch that. And your choices are the reputation of the online education or is it the cost? Is it the
availability of the course options? Is it the quality of instruction? Do you have concerns just in general
about studying at a distance? It's been a long time since I was in school and there was just no option
whatsoever to study at a distance.

[00:01:18.610] - Speaker 1
So that's been a long time, of course, but we've definitely found that is an issue for a lot of people. So
please go ahead. I see quite a few of you are still voting, so I'll give you another 10 seconds or so. But I'd
like to get onto the panel. We're running a little bit late on our program. So anyways, I'm going to go
ahead and close that and share the results with you. And it should be coming up on the screen here. But
I'll just tell you, cost is the winner. Three quarters of you are concerned about the cost, and I would like us
to just do a quick, maybe one or two of you could talk about whether financial aid is available for these
kinds of programs as we head into our panel discussion. Could somebody just address that really
quickly?

[00:02:16.890] - Speaker 2
Sure, I'll be happy to. We definitely have a financial aid process. I would suspect that's at the College of
Professional Studies, Northeast University, I suspect it's similar to the other universities where you
complete the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, which is at Fafsaedu gov and that beyond in the
PDF, and it includes the summer to the four quarters. And then depending on when you enroll, it
encompasses the terms that you enroll in for the academic year. So if you enroll for the spring, it will take
you to the next spring. You'll need the personal identification number and each university should have
that. And then there's obviously student financial services for each of the universities, too.

[00:03:02.570] - Speaker 1
Okay, great. Well, thank you, Cordilla. So we're going to keep moving here. We're going to head into our
panel, and I'd like the panelists to unmute yourselves and speak up. The first question that we thought
would be interesting is what do people need to think about when considering continuing their education?
Steve, you want to take a stab at that one?
[00:03:24.720] - Speaker 3
Yeah, I'll jump in here. People ask all the time, how do you get started in the GIS business? And they just
want to get in. But I usually throw it back at them and I say, well, what do you want to do in the GIS
business? Because there's just so many opportunities, whether you want to be a software developer, a
programmer analyst, a manager, a supervisor, whatever. So you really have to start painting a picture for
yourself in terms of what you want to do. And I ask students to think about where would you like to be in a
year or two years or five years, and then use that to let us help you get connected to the right people. So
you're not trying to send a resume to everybody, but we can get you in contact with the people that have
the same kind of interests or have the kind of jobs that you might be interested in.

[00:04:10.750] - Speaker 1
Great. There's a question that came in from the audience, and I'm going to throw this one in at this point
because it really kind of relates. I've been in the field for 20 years, and it seems to be getting harder to
stay on top of all the technological advances in the field. I can totally feel that. I feel my options are either
to redouble my efforts in the technical realm or to consider pursuing a management track, like becoming a
director or an executive director. Do any of the speakers have a perspective on those options, given the
current state of the GIS field and the future direction of the field? And it's kind of related to this what do
you want to be when you grow up? Thing, cordless or anybody else? You have any thoughts on that?

[00:04:51.790] - Speaker 2
What I would say is yes. Technology has just evolved so quickly over the last 20 years, 50 years even,
and you do have to keep up to date. It behooves us to have some generic comprehension of routines and
programs that are available to us and adapt between different software platforms. So in a sense, you
have to keep on top of things whether you want to or not. I do feel like we are somewhat plateauing, so I
don't think the rate of advancement is as much anymore. And honestly, people do tend to gravitate then
to either administration, teaching or management when your interests change, or when you want to
oversee things more opposed to staying involved with the detailed technical picture. So I think both
options are viable. It's worthwhile just doing continuing education in any shape or form, whether it's a
software company's own webinars, whether you take new courses or go to conferences, just to stay in
touch with the changes. Whether you're doing it from a lower level or an upper level, you need to know
what's going on.

[00:06:04.210] - Speaker 1
Well, a lot of people have joined the webinar today because a lot of them are in jobs, but they are
interested in figuring out how to change jobs, how to break into the field. We have one question here from
the audience. Many of the geospatial analyst jobs in my field of interest require experience in different
intelligence types math, int, SIGINT, et cetera, for the fusion into GEOINT products. Can I get experience
in these other INTs through academic education? So kind of relates to this job placement and networking
slide. Porter, you want to talk about this one?
[00:06:42.610] - Speaker 2
Yes. I feel like I just need to hear the question one more time.

[00:06:46.530] - Speaker 1
Yeah, it has to do with how do I get experience in the different intelligence types?

[00:06:53.890] - Speaker 2
Well, some of it is just by starting. So this is a good step, finding out what is out there, what's accessible
for you, what course options are out there, whether you can specialize in a certain area. Who will your
professors be? Will they work in the industry? Can I network that way? Is there alumni base? Can I keep
in contact with my fellow students? Can I hear what they're doing? Do instructors post new job
opportunities? Northeastern has a big experiential learning theme. It's a cooperative education. So we do
offer internships. We do offer internships for credit. So if I hear of an internship opportunity, I will let the
students know. In that way, the student can then be connected. If a student is placed outside of Boston
and has their own intern interest, we can incorporate that too. So a lot of it is just like having that first step
in the door networking, being in touch with your professors, being in touch with your fellow students, and
opening up the opportunity just to learn and hear what is available to you in your preferred discipline. You
have to narrow it down a little bit at first.

[00:08:04.990] - Speaker 2
But if it's GEOINT, go for colleges that offer the geo intelligence. Yeah, actually, which we all are, I think.

[00:08:13.600] - Speaker 1
Yeah. And we actually have the geo certificate at Penn State. Anthony, can you just mention that real
quick?

[00:08:20.460] - Speaker 3
Yeah.

[00:08:20.830] - Speaker 4
So we offer a certificate in geospatial intelligence and an option within our MGIS degree and also the
Homeland Security Master's degree. So we have three different options for geospatial intelligence
professionals or people who seek to be professionals in those areas, and they include all the various INTs
that were mentioned as part of those sort of a synthetic curriculum. There about analytical reasoning in
geospatial intelligence, so get in touch with us about that.

[00:08:44.070] - Speaker 1
Yeah, okay. And Devin, I also wanted to ask if you would chime in a little bit on job placement and
networking.

[00:08:50.470] - Speaker 5
Yeah, I think Steve probably said it best then and then it's been repeated by a number of people probably
the most important thing to be able to do is just network. So you network, network, network. And the other
thing is, Joseph Kirsky also mentioned something he's with ESRI. He said that one thing that GIS people
have is an opportunity to make their own opportunities. And he said there's lots of places that need GIS
specialists who don't know they need the GIS specialists. So be aware of those kinds of opportunities that
don't necessarily appear in a regular ad or in a kind of a regular place you would go, but look out and look
for mom and pop organizations. Look for small businesses that might benefit from those kind of skills.

[00:09:29.550] - Speaker 1
That's a really good point. A lot of times it doesn't say GIS in the job title, and people don't even quite
know what they're reaching for. Okay, so concerns people have about online learning rich, can you start
us out here?

[00:09:43.130] - Speaker 6
Absolutely. I feel that I can speak to this at least somewhat intelligently. I've been probably teaching
online since 15 years ago when we first started doing that sort of thing. And one of the things, I think that
students who are looking towards an online.