Kinda-AcademicStuff that's a little more serious, but not really up to academic par.

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Introducing a 3D Google Earth Model of UWFox

At UWFox this spring, GEO 106 encountered a number of technical problems largely related to software and hardware obsolescence. So old were these machines that even our resident Helpdesk miracle workers found the challenges daunting. Despite mounting frustrations, the students kept an overwhelmingly positive attitude and pushed forward.

Just after midterm, an important GIS lesson was again aborted by the software company’s failure to support its older products still in use. At that time, the class discussed alternate project lessons that could provide a laboratory and application for all necessary skills while creating a product useful beyond the limits of this particular course section or semester.

With this, the first three-dimensional model of the University of Wisconsin-Fox Valley campus was born.

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Diversity in Planning Workshop - East Central Regional Planning Commission

I gave the keynote address at the recent Diversity in Planning Workshop held by the East Central Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission, April 27, 2012 in Neenah. Read more

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From Absaroka to Yazoo: The 125 United States That Could've Been

I allowed my own mind to wander and I came up with the beginnings of a historical geography narrative for the United States of my own, drawing on each of these sources. How could I spell this out? Well, I'm no novelist, because I just really don't have the imagination or skills necessary to put together a story in that format. However, I can make maps here and there, and I firmly believe that maps can do a pretty good job telling a story. What did I end up with? My own alternate history U.S. map of 125 states Read more

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"The Ritual of Catharsis" (video)

It's been a long, long, LONG four years on the job market with over 100 rejection letters. I decided that it's time to fry them in a ritualistic manner, to free myself from the weight that was, for so long, an almost unimaginable burden. Read more

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Push & Pull Factors Assignment, Spring 2011

Every semester, I give students a basic assignments asking them to "Rate the States." After they do that, we work through some simple analyses as a bridge into discussing push and pull factors. Here are the results from my Spring 2011 courses at the University of Akron. Read more

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Detroit, Eminem and Chrysler's Geographic Imagination

Exploring the geographic imagination expressed in the Chrysler advertisement featuring Eminem and the city of Detroit, Michigan, as debuted during the Super Bowl XLV broadcast. Read more

Our Epic Forthcoming Journey, and My New Project

Amy and I are using our trip to 2011 AAG in Seattle as an excuse to put together a crazy cross-country overland trip with a bunch of friends. Geographers FTW. Read more

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Mapping (Geo-)Autobiography: My Mental Map of the World

At the beginning of every semester, I use a mental mapping assignment in World Geography to stress to the students that memorizing maps isn't what geography is all about. But, up until now, I'd never tried it myself. So, last night, I sat down for a few minutes and drew a map. What I came up with was, well, pretty messy and it took up parts of four sheets, but I scanned it and used Photoshop to put it together and... voila! Read more

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Mapping (Geo-)Autobiography: Travel

A lot of travelers -- and especially geographers -- like to keep track of numbers of places they've been.... countries, states, continents, capitals, everything. It's a nice way to reflect upon past experiences, and yes, of course, brag to one's friends about those travels. A couple of my colleagues, Nick Wise and Emily Fekete, produced what they called "County Life Maps" earlier this year, highlighting the counties they had visited in the United States, and urged me to do the same. I was more than willing to oblige Read more

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Geographic Literacy: Our Job Isn't Finished

Of course, we all know that maps are not the end-all, be-all of geography; far from it, maps are only a small part of what geographers do.  At the same time, though, maps are useful tools that are crucial, especially to beginning students, in helping represent the world and provide a basis for understanding the more interesting aspects of our field.  With all of this in mind, I'm bringing forth an activity that I do on the first day of every World Regional Geography course I teach.  After we go over the syllabus, I hand each student a blank piece of Hammermill copy paper and give them the following instructions: Draw a map of the world, label what's important. Here are the results. Read more