For ten years, ESRI has promoted the Community Atlas as a program through which teachers and club leaders could get kids engaged in doing GIS. The project is simple: Kids put together a profile of their community, consisting of 10-20 original maps and 1000-2500 original words, and post it on the web. By filling out a little form about the group, the preparers create “metadata,” so the projects can be searched and compared. Viewers can search according to age of student, location, environment, calendar year, or any combination. And, in addition to seeing their project published, schools or clubs that submit an approved project earn free software.
Initial map from 1999-2000 Year “Model Project”
from Barrington (Rhode Island) Middle School
Over the last decade, hundreds of presentations were created, and we had model projects each year, but many more projects were begun than completed. The hardest part for most groups was creating web pages in the strict setup required by the Community Atlas structure. So, with the new decade, we have shifted to a new design. Instead of web pages with lots of little files, Community Atlas projects now consist of a single PDF file. These files are easier to create, and this new format opens the door to a little more creativity in design, but there are still guidelines to follow. The guidelines give a starting structure and some critical consistency within the wide-open universe of community presentations possible.
Initial map from 2008-2009 Year “Model Project”
from Lost Arts 4-H Club in Gray, Maine
To get a good idea of what kids can do, take a look at all each year’s “Model Project,” including last year’s project by a 4-H Club in Gray, Maine. We encourage schools and clubs to begin working on a document to submit this year! (The submission page will open in spring.) Check it out at www.esri.com/communityatlas!
- Charlie Fitzpatrick, Co-Manager, ESRI Schools Program