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A Tale of Two Cities: The case for blended learning for GIS at Masters

level for Victoria and CanterburyMairead de Roiste, Victoria University of Wellington

Femke Reitsma, University of Canterbury

Ako Victoria 18th April 2011

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Outline

• The Why?• The What?• The How?• And the unexpected…

GIS at VUW

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GIS Lecturer

GIS Technician

GEOG 215: Introduction to Geographic Information Science and Systems (GIS)

GEOG 315: Advanced GeographicInformation Science and Systems (GIS)

PHYG 415: Introduction to Geographic Information Science and Systems (GIS) for Postgraduates

Contributions to:Research Methods courses in Earth Sciences and GeographyFirst year course in Physical Geography

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Personal Motivation for Collaboration• Students with more advanced GIS

knowledge at Masters and Honours level

• Tailored courses for postgraduate students

• Attracting quality students with similar research interests

• Reaching out!– Sharing resources and research

collaboration

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Industry Interest

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Development of the MGIS

• 2006. Idea for a joint Masters in GIS first raised

• 2009. UC gets funding to advance a Masters in GIS from the NZ Tertiary Education Commission (TEC)

• 2009/2010. Consortium of universities work on the pilot- 2x workshops (course development and pedagogy)

• 2010. Decisions made for new course application for 2011. Canterbury and Victoria ready to start, Otago and Auckland needed more time.

• 2010. Interdisciplinary Masters in GIS (and PGDipGIS) developed that will run at UC in collaboration with Victoria in 2011.

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Initial Barriers

• Institutional approval– VUW Pilot 2011– Canterbury full steam ahead 2011

• Multiple locations– Remote technologies

• A cohesive cohort?– The student experience

• Staff interactions– Remote technologies

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Outline

• The Why?• The What?• The How?• And the unexpected…

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Programme

Year 1

Semester 1 Semester 2

Core Core

GISC 401: Foundations of GI ScienceGISC 404: Geospatial Analysis

GISC 402: GI Science ResearchGISC 403: Cartography & Visualisation

Electives (choose 2) Electives (choose 2)

GISC 405: GIS Programming and DatabasesGISC 406: Remote Sensing for Earth ObservationGISC 411: GIS in Health1 local approved elective

GISC 410: GIS 2.0GISC 412: Spatial Algorithms & ProgrammingGISC 413: Special Topic: Geomatic Data Acquisition1 local approved elective

Year 2

GISC 690: Research Thesis

MGIS team

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Femke Reitsma

Greg Breetzke

Simon Kingham

Peter Day Wolfgang Rack

Mairead de Roiste

Kelvin Barnsdale

The technical team!

Marcus Andreotti

Amber Pearson

Carl Cerecke

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Outline

• The Why?• The What?• The How?• And the unexpected…

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Pedagogy

• Blended Learning

• Intensive residential + ongoing virtual• Short burst in person + ongoing virtual• Weekly synchronous in-person/virtual

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Field course: Round 2

MGIS students and staff from Canterbury, Victoria and Otago at the second chance field course in Living Springs (20 minutes outside of Christchurch)

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Field course: Group Work

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Field course: Field Techniques

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Course Example

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Teaching Technology

KARENKiwi Advanced Research and Education Network

Scopia Desktop Access Grid

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Outline

• The Why?• The What?• The How?• And the unexpected…

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Dealing with the Unexpected

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Benefits

• Students– Greater variety– Alignment with research interests and future career paths

• Teaching staff– Specialised teaching– Alignment of student projects with research interests– Research collaboration potential

• Wider Schools– Taking non-VUW courses – Reducing over reliance on staff

• Institutions– Attracting quality students, esp. internationally– Industry scholarships– Response to industry demand

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MGIS 2012-onwardsThank You!Any Questions?

Further information: www.mgis.ac.nz