GIS Day 2024 Events

The  Spatial Analysis Lab  at the University of Richmond has been celebrating GIS Day for over 15 years with various events, speakers, workshops and the legendary cake contest. This year we are pleased to offer several exciting celebratory happenings starting with a Georef-A-Thon on Wed 11/13 in the SAL, and the headliner event on Fri 11/15 in Jepson with a speaker series followed by a cake contest. We hope to see you there!!

We invite you to celebrate GIS Day 2024 in the Jepson Lecture Hall on Friday, November 15th from 2-4 pm! Join us for presentations and Q&A sessions with speakers LaToya Gray-Sparks and Maggie Cawley. 

LaToya Gray-Sparks is a former University of Richmond employee who worked as a User Support Specialist at Boatwright Memorial Library and currently serves as the  Community Outreach Coordinator  in the Community Services Division at the Virginia Department of Historic Resources. LaToya completed the UR SPCS Professional GIS Certificate program and went on to win the 2021 ESRI Story Maps Competition with her story  Planned Destruction . LaToya will be talking about her path to using GIS for community engaged research.

Maggie Cawley is the  Executive Director for OpenStreetMap US  and a University of Richmond Student alumni (‘03 World Politics and Diplomacy Major). She will discuss the power of maps for data-driven decision making, as well as her path to becoming the executive director of a company that hosts one of the largest geospatial databases in the world. 

Join us by entering yourself or your team into the Georef-a-thon presented by the SAL and the  Digital Scholarship Lab  at the University of Richmond. Compete with other teams to correctly georeference old maps of Richmond and win prizes in the Spatial Analysis Lab on Wednesday, November 13th from 5:30 to 7:15 PM! (Pizza provided.)

No need to be an expert! The first 30 minutes will be spent reviewing the purpose and process of georeferencing, and we'll go through a practice round before starting the competition. 

Happy georeferencing!

Register you or your team here:

 https://forms.gle/aYDknUrX89v2tjhv8 

Celebrate GIS day 2024 by entering a cake-making competition!

Cake designs should evoke something about maps, the globe, and/or geography. Individuals can enter by themselves, or a team of students can collaborate on a single cake.

Cakes will need to be presented for voting and judging in Jepson Lecture Hall on Friday, November 15th at 2 pm. We will announce the winner and eat the cakes at the conclusion of the GIS day 2024 celebration, which will be held from 2-4 pm on November 15th in Jepson Lecture Hall.

Happy baking!

Register you or your team here:

 https://forms.gle/wpSKRv7bL2o8VCPU8 

Did you know........ that the Spatial Analysis Lab has been holding cake contests since 2008??

GIS Day is a internationally recognized celebration and started 25 years ago! This year it will be on Wednesday November 20th, 2024. Many GIS Day events across the globe will be happening, so keep a look out on more ways to engage in spatial activities.

Jack Dangermond, Dr. Roger Tomlinson, and students celebrate the first GIS Day at Murch Elementary School in Washington, DC. Dangermond credits Ralph Nader as the person who inspired GIS Day, now celebrated worldwide on the third Wednesday in November during Geography Awareness Week.