Category Archives: Announcement

Join in the celebration of Geography Awareness Week 2021!

By iowaviewNovember 11, 2021Activity, Announcement, Education, Event, Geography Awareness Week, Outreach#geoweek, #IowaView, #osmgeoweek, #thatsgeography, celebrategeoweek, Geography Awareness Week 2021, National Geographic Society, Outreach

November 14-20, 2021

Geography Awareness Week is coming soon. We will be sharing information about GIS and geography related careers as well as activities and games to help you sharpen your geography and geospatial skills throughout the week. Check IowaView daily for a new topic.

The History of Geography Awareness Week:

The National Geographic Society created Geography Awareness Week over 25 years ago as a way to celebrate and raise awareness of geography both as a discipline and as a part of daily life. The National Geographic Society felt there was a dangerous deficiency in American education with limited exposure to geography too many young Americans are unable to make effective decisions, understand geo-spatial issues, or even recognize their impacts as global citizens.
— see more at the National Geographic Website

Join in the fun ~ TeachOSM Back-to-School Night ~ September 21

By iowaviewSeptember 10, 2021Activity, Announcement, Education, Event, Humanitarian Mapping, Imagery, OpenStreetMap, ResourceBack to School Night, Humanitarian Mapping, Learn something new, Map-Alongs, OpenStreetMap, September 21, service learning, teachers, TeachOSM

When: September 21st, 2021 8:00 PM through 9:00 PM (Eastern)

Attention educators and mappers! Join TeachOSM Tuesday, 21 September for our first ever ‘back-to-school’ night. We’re offering an informal open house to introduce our programming. This hour-long event will feature brief demos from teachers and mappers to enable you to:

Find out more about how you can put OSM in your school
Learn how to take advantage of our Map-Alongs and other educational programming
Find out how you can get support open mapping education in your community

Sign up now to reserve your space!

Are you looking forward to the Landsat 9 Launch?

By iowaviewAugust 11, 2021AmericaView, Announcement, Education, Landsat, NASA, Observation, Resource, USGSA History of the Landsat Program, birth of NASA 1958, earth observation, Ellie Leydsman McGinty, founding of USGS 1879, Google Earth Tour, Landsat 9 Launch, September 16, UtahView

Rocket Launch from Vandenberg Space Force Base, Lompoc, California

Photo Credit: U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Ian Dudley — Photo Credit: U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Ian Dudley

Landsat 9 is scheduled to be launched on September 16, 2021. This will mark almost 50 years of earth observation by US satellites. In preparation for this historic launch, we will be sharing several interactive documents about the history of the Landsat mission as well as the information about the Landsat 9 mission.

Today we would like to share with you, A History of the Landsat Program, developed by Ellie McGinty at UtahView. It’s an interactive Google Earth Tour, which documents major moments in earth observation history through a combination of maps, text, and curated images starting with the founding of the United States Geological Survey in 1879 through the birth of NASA in 1958 to the conception of Landsat in 1970 and all the way to the present day launching of Landsat 9.

Camp Landsat Counts Down to the Landsat 9 Launch

By iowaviewAugust 2, 2021Activity, Announcement, Education, Event, Game, Imagery, Landsat, NASA, Outreach, Resource9 weeks of summer camp fun, A postcard from camp, Camp Landsat, Count down to the Landsat 9 Launch, crafts, Explore, games, Landsat earth science, NASA, September 2021, Week 1: Rocks and Rivers, Week 2: Farms & Food, Week 3: Beaches & Reefs, Week 4: Forests, Week 5: Cities & Suburbs, Week 6: Fires & Floods, Week 7: Ice & Climate, Week 8: Health & Wellness, Week 9: Flora & Fauna

Each week NASA’s Landsat Science team will explore a unique aspect of Landsat earth science (see themes below). Weekly features include Landsat related crafts and games, revisiting each sequential Landsat mission as well a weekly postcard from camp. Stop by each week of camp to explore a new theme.

Release of Cover Crop ID Toolbox and Handbook

By iowaviewMay 12, 2021Announcement, Environmental Change, Imagery, Observation, Outreach, Remote Sensing, TutorialsCover Crop ID Toolbox, IowaView, New Release

IowaView staff have released the Cover Crop ID Toolbox and Handbook. This toolbox allows users to quickly identify possible cover crop fields using three Sentinel-2 images from the fall, early spring, and late spring downloaded from the Earth Explorer website based on field boundaries supplied by the user. On the project webpage you can download the toolbox which works with both ArcMap or ArcGIS Pro as well as the Cover Crop ID Toolbox Handbook that provides additional details about each step of the tool.

IowaView Staff Present at the Iowa Water Conference!

By iowaviewApril 8, 2021Announcement, Education, Event, Outreach#IowaWaterConference2021, Developing a remotely sensed cover crop identification tool, poster, virtual conference

Below is the poster that IowaView staff displayed at the virtual 2021 Iowa Water Conference, April 6-8, 2021. Click on the image below to explore the poster.

Celebrating the “Mother of Landsat” – Virginia T. Norwood

By iowaviewMarch 30, 2021Announcement, Conference, Education, Landsat, Women's History Month"Mother of Landsat", ASPRS Lifetime Achievement Award, first multspectral scanner (MSS) on-board Landsat-1, Landsat Hero, satellite communications, Virginia T Norwood

“I have seen further by standing on the shoulders of giants.” ~ Sir Isaac Newton

This week is the virtual American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (ASPRS) conference. At today’s conference, the ASPRS Lifetime Achievement Award was presented to Virginia T. Norwood.

Virginia Norwood is known as the “Mother of Landsat.” When interviewed by Laura Rocchio for a NASA Landsat Science article, Ms. Norwood was asked if she is comfortable with this title and she replied, “Yes. I like it, and it’s apt. I created it. I birthed it; and I fought for it.” In recognition of her contributions to satellite communications and optics for over 40 years, including the design, building, promotion and operation of the first multspectral scanner (MSS) on-board Landsat-1, Ms. Norwood was awarded the 2021 ASPRS Lifetime Achievement Award.

To learn more about Virginia’s story: https://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/article/virginia-t-norwood-mother-landsat

Congratulations, Virginia! Thank you for all your contribution to Landsat and Science!

Exploring the Landscape of K-12 GIS and Remote Sensing Education in Iowa

By iowaviewMarch 2, 2021Announcement, Education, Outreach, Remote Sensing, ResourceExploring the Landscape of K-12 GIS and Remote Sensing Education in Iowa, GIS and remote sensing education, Iowa K-12 public school teachers, Iowa superintendents, Survey

IowaView staff have launched a study to understand the current use of GIS (Geographic Information Systems) software and technology in K-12 public school classrooms across the state as well as to gauge interest among non-users. The study has two surveys: one for superintendents and one for K-12 teachers. These surveys will provide a snapshot of GIS in K-12 education as well as identify barriers and opportunities for the use of GIS technology among non-users.

Here is the link to the teacher survey: tinyurl.com/IAK12GIS.

Please contact Amy Logan for any questions regarding the survey.

Iowa Student Map Contest 2021: Mapping Unique Iowa Features

By iowaviewFebruary 1, 2021Activity, Announcement, Education, Event, Iowa Student Map Contest 2021, Map, Outreachesri, Grades 4-12, Iowa Geographic Information Council, Iowa Student Map Contest 2021, Mapping Unique Iowa Features, May 12 2021, William Penn University

The 2021 Map Competition for Iowa students is now underway.

Students in grades 4-12 are invited, with their teachers, to participate in this year’s mapping contest sponsored by Esri, the Iowa Geographic Information Council (IGIC), and William Penn University. This year’s theme is Mapping Unique Iowa Features.

Contest Website: https://sites.google.com/site/iowamapcontest/home

Story Maps Website: https://www.esri.com/en-us/arcgis/products/arcgis-storymaps/overview

How to participate: Use the Story Map application to tell a story about a unique feature site using a map and pictures.

There will be $100 cash prize and a certificate for the top five middle school (grades 4-8) and top high school (grades 9-12) map entries. The top entry from each state will be submitted to the national competition hosted by Esri.

Schools must submit their winners to the state for judging by 5 p.m. on Wednesday, May 12, 2021. Iowa GIS professionals will judge the entries so Iowa awards may be announced, and send winning entries on to Esri for the national competition.

OhioView presents Remote Sensing on a Shoestring

By iowaviewJanuary 28, 2021Activity, Announcement, Event, Remote SensingEarth Science, Estimating Evapotranspiration, GLOBE Observer, Google Earth Engine, Google Earth Pro, Land Cover Classification, Landsat, Multispec, OhioView, QGIS, Remote Sensing on a shoestring, Sentinel 2

Are you interested in learning more about remote sensing but have a limited budget? This February, OhioView will be presenting , “Remote sensing on a shoestring,” and will guide you through how to begin using freely available software and data to perform remote sensing analysis.

Topics for each of the workshops (and their skill level) are as follows:

February 5, 2021, 9am – 1pm (EST):

Earth Science Missions Imagery using Google Earth Pro (beginner level)
Normalized Difference Calculations with Sentinel-2 using Multispec (intermediate level)
Land cover classification of Sentinel-2 images using QGIS (beginner level)

Use this link to register for the February 5 workshop: https://forms.gle/Z269biTar4vU23DU7 The last day for registration for the February 5 workshop will be January 28, 2021.

February 26, 2021, 9am – 1pm (EST):

Classification Using Google Earth Engine (intermediate level)
Ground validation using the GLOBE Observer app (beginner level)
Estimating Evapotranspiration with Landsat using QGIS (intermediate level).

Use this link to register for the February 26 workshop: https://forms.gle/HkRGQ3fn8S81443U6 . The last day for registration for the February 26 workshop will be February 18, 2021.