Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
recommendations has taken place on a discipline wide basis. Of most concern was the
lack of action on a new edition of the BoK 1.0. It is this issue that we now address.
5
The Body of Knowledge 2.0
The editors of BoK 1.0 suggested that “a new editorial team or Task Force be empa-
nelled within two years to consider methodologies for critique and revision that would
lead to a second edition no later than 2012.” A six year time line for a revised BoK
was suggested because this is the average time over which renewals of the Computer
Science Curriculum has taken place in the US. However, this did not occur. More
recently the UCGIS organization has begun to investigate the development of a BoK
2.0 and there has been some activity to which we will now turn, although no new
BoK has yet emerged.
Part of this new activity has focused on a new Geospatial Technology Competency
Model [10]. This new interest has been due, in part, to the US Department of Labor's
Employment and Training Administration (DOLETA) recommendations in the field
of GIScience. Ten geospatial occupations are now defined, the first six of which are
new: Geospatial Information Scientists and Technologists; Geographic Information
Systems Technicians; Remote sensing Scientists and Technologists; Remote sensing
Technicians; Precision Agriculture Technicians; Geodetic Surveyors; Surveyors; Sur-
veying Technicians; Mapping Technicians and Cartographers and Photogrammetrists.
Presumably there is not only a need to define competencies within each of these posi-
tions but also a need to develop academic pathways towards those competencies,
pathways that provide an integrated and explicit curriculum. In 2012 the Urban and
Regional Information Systems Association (URISA) in cooperation with DOLETA
issued a brief describing a new Geospatial Management Competency Model
(GMCM) [36]. This model describes the 74 competencies and 18 competency areas
for managers in the geospatial industry.
These developments in the US have stimulated an interest in Europe in developing
similar definitions of how to define a Core Curriculum/Body of Knowledge that cha-
racterizes GIS expertise. Perhaps the leading proponent of the use of the BoK 1.0 to
inform, systematize and integrate the GIScience educational community in Europe is
Frans Rip. At the 2011 LeGIO-WORKSHOP, GIS-education in a changing academic
environment, Rip gave the Keynote Paper: GI-Education: The Impact of EduMapping
[30] where he advocated using the categorization used in the BoK 1.0. He cited the
work of Masik [25] who for her master's thesis surveyed 113 respondents from 99
universities in 27 countries (25 were European). Her results showed that 40% of the
respondents were aware of the BoK 1.0, while 22% were actually using it and a fur-
ther 25% intended to use it. Given European familiarity with the US research the As-
sociation of Geographic Information Laboratories Europe (AGILE) launched the
EduMapping Initiative in 2009 “to characterize [the] nature [of GI Education and to
make]….. courses and curricula comparable on their content” [30]. Rip's only con-
cern was that he knew that US researchers were actively working on a BoK 2.0 and
