September 10–12, 2020 at West Virginia University in Morgantown, WV
Overview
Personal stories and narratives are often tied deeply to landscape. Mountains provide perspective; rivers connect peoples; towns establish identities for communities. Stories also help express and address contemporary issues of change, migration, growth, and loss.
Geospatial literacy describes the ways in which a person views, understands, and interacts with the world. The geoliterate individual has an understanding of the dynamic physical and cultural forces at work in different places, and their spatial awareness of the world allows them to see and understand patterns, distributions, and interactions between the physical and human realms.
With the generous support of the National Geographic Society, Mapping the West Virginian Experience will support a cohort of educators and scholars as they collect and visualize the stories of West Virginia using mapping technology in September 2020. Working in district-based teams, participants will be trained in the use of GIS tools to collect and display data—then publish instructional resources on how to use these maps.
Podcast
Structure and Participants
The “Mapping with GIS in the Humanities” training session will be hosted at West Virginia University in Morgantown, WV, September 10–12, 2020. Participants will return January 25, 2021 for a showcase event. Applications will be accepted from teachers and education influencers at K–12 public and independent schools currently located in West Virginia.
Instructors
Chris Bunin, Teacher of AP Human Geography and Geospatial Technologies, Albemarle High School, VA
During the past decade Bunin has collaborated on projects focused on leveraging geospatial technologies and geo-literacy in the classroom. These include: “The Virginia Experiment” and “America on the World Stage” Teaching American History Projects; the iSTEM Teacher Scholars Program: An Applied Geospatial Curriculum for Middle Schools; “Transatlantic Teacher Scholars: Change Over Time and Place in the Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery”; ESRI’s GeoInquiries for US history and human geography; the US Census Bureau’s Statistics in Schools Program; and the award winning book Jamestown to Appomattox: Mapping US History Using GIS (Carte Diem Press). He is also assistant professor of geography at Piedmont Virginia Community College and a member of the Virginia Geographic Alliance Steering Committee. Chris was named the 2016 Secondary Social Studies Teacher of the Year by the National Council for the Social Studies.
Andy Mink, Vice President for Education Programs, National Humanities Center
Mink previously served as the executive director of LEARN NC at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill after working as the director of outreach and education for the Virginia Center for Digital History and then the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia. With all these organizations, he has designed and led professional development programs for K–12 and university educators that focus on hands-on instructional models. In 2002, Andy was named the National Experiential Educator of the Year by the National Society of Experiential Education. He is a Master Teacher with the Organization of American Historians in their Distinguished Speaker Program and also serves on the executive board of the National Council for Social Studies and the board of trustees for the National Council for History Education. He was awarded the 2015 Outstanding Support for Geography Education Award by the National Council for Geographic Education and serves as a GeoMentor with the Association of American Geographers.
Mike Williams, Education Projects Manager, National Humanities Center
Prior to joining the Center, Williams was twice recognized as the Warren County Schools Teacher of the Year and was the 2017 Organization of American Historians Tachau National Teacher of the Year. He was a contributing writer for the texts Family History in the Classroom and When We Were British: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Visualizing Early America, as well as in Time magazine’s “25 Moments That Changed History” series. He has been awarded fellowships through the West Indies Teacher Institute and Rural Teachers Global Trust where his research connected classrooms in London, Scotland, Ghana, and Barbados. He serves in a number of capacities, including as a member of the executive boards of the North Carolina Council for the Social Studies and the Warren County Community Center, on the steering committee of the North Carolina Geographic Alliance, and as a contributor for the UNC–Duke African Diaspora Fellows Program.
