In one of the labs in our Advanced GIS Applications course, we used ArcGIS Pro and Random Forest machine learning to predict the percentage of households without internet access across U.S. counties. That sounds more complicated than it really is. The idea was simple: take county-level data, prepare it properly, train a model, test it against data it had not
Tag: spatial analysis
Spring 2026 is officially over. Four courses completed. And after submitting the final exam for the last course, I experienced a feeling unfamiliar to graduate students: Silence. No deadlines.No discussion boards.No professor casually posting: “Just one final reminder.” That sentence alone has caused more stress than actual exams. The strange part is that this is already my second master’s degree.
The Moment You Finally Check There is always a small moment of hesitation before checking grades. You log in.You find the page.You hover over the link for a second. Even when you think things are going well, graduate school has a way of surprising you. Sometimes pleasantly. Sometimes not. So this week I checked my midterm grades for the Spring
Most people think GIS is about making maps. In reality, the most valuable GIS work happens when spatial analysis supports real decisions. This lab focused on a practical problem faced by many communities: how to identify open-space parcels inside flood-prone areas that may qualify for FEMA Community Rating System (CRS) credits and potentially reduce flood insurance costs. What makes this
Introduction In a recent lab exercise, I worked with GeoDa, developed by the University of Chicago Center for Spatial Data Science, to examine spatial structure in geographic data. The objective was not simply to map values, but to determine whether patterns were statistically clustered, dispersed, or random. A map shows distribution. Spatial analysis tests whether that distribution has structure. What
Florida’s interstates are among the deadliest in the United States, and Brevard County has seen an increasing number of traffic accidents in recent years. In this lab, I focused on the workflow itself: taking crash points and road segments and using ArcGIS Pro analysis tools to turn them into defensible hot spot maps (including fatality hot spots and peak-time hot
I get asked a lot as to why GIS. Why study it when I already hold a Master’s in Cybersecurity and more IT degrees and certs than anyone cares to count. By now I could have stopped. I could have sat back, waved the certificates, and called myself an expert. But here is the truth. I do not consider myself
I’m excited to share that I’m currently working through the Cartographic Creations in ArcGIS Pro learning path on Learn ArcGIS.This series focuses on making maps that not only work, but also communicate by combining data, layout, symbology, charts, and narrative into a cohesive visual story. (learn.arcgis.com) So far, I have tackled: A few reflections: Next steps include finalizing the layout,
Mention the years 1905, 1939, and 1959 in the opening lines of a geography paper and most readers will roll their eyes, expecting some crusty old theory from the 1960s gathering dust in the archives. But Pattison’s Four Traditions of Geography refuses to be a relic. It is the skeleton that still props up the flesh of the discipline. And
When the world shut down in 2020, most people were panic-buying toilet paper. I, on the other hand, was busy making maps. Not just any maps—quantitative thematic maps that could tell a story more compelling than any infographic ever could. Armed with ArcGIS Online, ArcGIS Pro, and a nerdy love for cartographic detail, I created a visual narrative of California’s