For each lesson, I will ask you to read parts of your textbooks, online materials I select, or articles I've found. As you can see below, I'll try to make it as clear as possible what you're expected to do by always identifying specific reading assignments in a separate orange box.
Part of your class participation grade will be making responses on our discussion board to questions I pose about the readings. Whenever you see a Respond prompt, you need to respond to that question as directed. Occasionally, I'll mark items Think about when I simply want to direct your thoughts as you read. You can trust me to control your brain. I'm an expert.
For our first set of readings, we will focus on setting the stage for the rest of the lessons this term. First, I'd like you to read two different white papers developed by folks at Esri. These provide a simple overview of the common terms and topics associated with GIS for Emergency Management, and they show you how the GIS goliath perceives the role of geospatial tools and methods in the context of Emergency Management. You just read a bit about how FEMA sees the state of affairs, and I think you'll notice some key similarities (and differences) in how the world is viewed from those two perspectives.
Second, I've selected a chapter from a National Academies of Science report written in 2007 that sets a research agenda for GIS in Emergency Management. The chapter I've picked for this week focuses on how GIS was or could have been used in a few different disaster scenarios.
Finally, I'd like you to start reading Style for Students to begin thinking critically about your writing habits. You'll be doing a fair bit of writing in this class and if you're a bit rusty on those skills, this resource is a great one to review.
As you read the three different worst case scenarios, it should be apparent that a key challenge is simply developing a rapid picture of the spatial extent of a disaster. If you assume that a given disaster will disable local EOCs and their accompanying geospatial tools and data, describe at least two ways that emergency managers brought in from afield could quickly assemble data that describes the extent of the disaster. Post your ideas. Then respond to a different post with constructive comments or criticism.
NOTE: Respond to this assignment in the Lesson 1 Reading Discussion Forum in Canvas [4].
Links
[1] http://www.esri.com/library/whitepapers/pdfs/arcgis-for-emergency-management.pdf
[2] http://www.esri.com/library/whitepapers/pdfs/disastermgmt.pdf
[3] http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=11793
[4] http://psu.instructure.com
[5] http://www.e-education.psu.edu/styleforstudents/node/1787