Press Release
4 March 2016
KMUTT partners with the European Commission to develop graduate-level geospatial curriculum
King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi (KMUTT) has joined the Geoservices-4-Sustainability (GeoS4S) project funded by the European Commission's Erasmas+ Programme. This three-year, one million Euro project brings together geospatial experts from four European, three Thai and three Chinese universities to develop a set of course modules focusing on new spatial technologies and applications. When completed, the GeoS4S teaching materials will be freely available online. Furthermore, the modules will be designed from the outset to be appropriate for distance learning environments, so they can have the maximum impact and utility.
GeoS4S focuses on advanced topics which are not currently covered in typical master's level curricula in GIS or geoinformatics. Many studies have indicated a severe, world-wide lack of individuals who are qualified for geospatially-related jobs. The GeoS4S project aims to help fill this skills and knowledge gap and to build educational capacity at the partner institutions, especially those in Asia.
A secondary goal of GeoS4S is to develop cross-regional relationships between individuals and organizations. The project plan includes three meetings each year, which will rotate among all the partner institutions. The most recent meeting, February 21-25, 2016, was hosted by Chiang Mai University and took the form of a workshop where each partner presented their draft syllabi for comments and suggestions by other particpants. At the next meeting, to be held in June at Palacký University in the Czech Republic, each institution will present sample lessons from their modules.
GeoS4S will also create an international community of future researchers and experts, by hosting three summer schools to test the educational modules. Graduate students from all ten universities will receive financial support from the project to attend these summer schools, where they will not only have the opportunity to acquire new knowledge but also to meet colleagues and gain friends.
Dr. Pariwate Varnakovida and Dr. Sally E. Goldin from the KMUTT Geospatial Engineering and Innovation Center (kGeo) (http://www.kgeo.org) represent KMUTT in this project. They will contribute modules on food sustainability modeling and participatory/community GIS to the GeoS4S effort. They will also consult with, and critique the materials produced by, specific partners from Europe and China.
For more information about the GeoS4S program, visit http://www.zgis.net/geos4s or contact Dr. Goldin at .