I am 100% committed to bringing the usefulness and variety that GIS can offer to the people of the local community.  I am especially thrilled when I see young people with an aptitude and/or interest in geography, and I believe that the moment that they begin to become curious about the topic, is the time to nurture that interest and show how GIS can start to answer questions. I enjoy speaking to local students about GIS as a career choice, or organizing other student events such as a Mini-GIS Camp with the local 4H Club.  I also work closely with the Historical Society in my county.  GIS is exciting, and I hope to be able to pass that excitement on to anyone that will listen!

 

I also am deeply committed to showing government and commercial agencies/businesses how GIS can serve their needs in ways that they may not have been aware of.  Since I began working in local government, I have noticed that many agencies are unaware of how multi-faceted GIS really is, and therefore, GIS is often under-utilized.  The other reason for this is that technologies are advancing so rapidly, that unless an employee is committed to staying abreast of advancements in GIS, assets are not managed as well as they might be.  I seek to work with various departments to help them to learn how GIS can expand their ability to analyze their data visually and traditionally in order to allocate resources and facilitate their workflow.

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This heart-felt desire to share my love for GIS has led me to me to take on some volunteer roles, or added non-required functions within my current job.  Please see below to learn more.

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• Local Cooperative Extension:  I have created maps and presented for their Horse farm Tours; I have spoken to area farmers at their Estate Conferences;

• Local 4H:  I organized, resourced, developed curriculum and taught a week-long GIS mini-Camp for children.  I have set up a non-profit organization copy of ArcGIS Online for the local 4H group.

• STEM program:  I presented at the  local High School to STEM students about GIS jobs

• Local High School Job Fairs:  I present at annual high school job fairs where students can learn about GIS

• Local Historical Society:  I am currently working with the historical society on a mapping project for the members to be able to use an ESRI app to collect cemetery data in the field.  I have created this app for them and customized it to meet their needs.  I have also been working on mapping all cemeteries in the county, and presented my work at a monthly meeting of the Historical Society.  I am also working on setting up a Storymaps for the Historical Society using ESRI's online mapping to do so.

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Other Involvement/Volunteer Projects:

• I worked with ISOLA and Dr. Barry Rodrigue in trying to establish a sister city relationship between Staryi-Atagi in Chechnya with the city of Lewiston, Maine.

• Working under the supervision of Dr. Firooza Pavri, have redesigned the Geography-Anthropology departments website

• I have created a website for the annual Knap-In that is hosted by the University of Southern Maine, and put on by the Geography-Anthropology Student's Association (GASA).

• I participated in fund-raising activities for habitat protection for the African Wildlife Foundation.

• I developed and maintained a website for my Primate Behavior class, in an effort to provide information about the protection of primate species, and facilitate discussion of primate behavior and protection.

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​I am always looking for more ways to contribute to the greater good of the community in which I reside and work.  If I can assist you with anything "GIS", or if you have other ideas in how I can utilize GIS for the greater good, please contact me.  Thank you.

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