Dude, Where’s My Cartography? GIS Workshops You Won’t Forget
We don’t know where you parked your car, but we can help you make a map to retrace your steps. And that’s just the first session! After that, we’ll go beyond basic cartography, covering common GIS operations and techniques in an easy and supportive environment that even the heads can follow.
This semester we’ll primarily be GISing with the desktop GIS software ArcGIS Pro, covering basic use and techniques that will get you comfortable and exploring on your own. If you’re interested in ArcGIS Online, we’ll briefly cover that in the last couple of sessions, and will do a deeper dive in the Spring. Not sure what the difference is? ArcGIS Pro is a Windows-only desktop program that you install on your (Windows) computer. ArcGIS Online is a web-based GIS platform that you access through a web browser on nearly any device. Mark Patterson sums it up well here. Still not sure? As always, feel free to contact us with any questions.
- Sessions are one hour and assume participants have no previous experience using GIS. These will be hands-on demonstrations with step-by-step tutorials. Feel free to pick and choose the sessions you think you’ll benefit from the most
- We will meet in-person in the Scholars’ Lab (Shannon Library 308) on Tuesdays from 2PM to 3PM, and openly welcome the UVA and larger Charlottesville community.
- We will provide laptops for easy access to ArcGIS Pro.
- Walk-ins are welcome, but due to a limited number of laptops, we strongly encourage registering using the links below or at our Events page. If you’re waitlisted, please contact us at uvagis@virginia.edu.
- We will not be offering a virtual option this semester. We apologize for any inconvenience.
- Please note, these workshops are not intended for course instruction. If you’re here at the direction of your professor, or if you’re teaching a class and would like to include GIS instruction, please contact us at uvagis@virginia.edu.
September 8th - Making Your First Map with ArcGIS Pro
Here’s your chance to get started with geographic information systems software in a friendly, jargon-free environment. This workshop introduces the skills you need to make your own maps. Along the way you’ll get familiar with the desktop GIS application ArcGIS Pro, and a gentle introduction to cartography. You’ll leave with your own cartographic masterpieces and tips for learning more in your pursuit of mappiness at UVA.
September 15th - Old Maps and Aerial Photos: Georeferencing in ArcGIS Pro
Would you like to see historical maps overlaid on modern aerial photography? Do you need to extract features of a map for use in GIS? Georeferencing is the first step. We will show you how to take a scan of a paper map and align in it in ArcGIS.
September 22nd - Mapping Your Spreadsheet: Plotting Lat/Lon Coordinates
Do you have a spreadsheet of Lat/Lon coordinates you would like to see on a map? We will show you how to do that and more. ArcGIS Pro makes it easy to take your tabular data and generate stylized points on a map.
September 29th - Mapping Street Addresses (Geocoding), and More Spatial Things
Do you have a list of street addresses crying out to be mapped? Have a list of zip codes or census tracts you wish to associate with other data? We’ll start with addresses and other things spatial and end with points on a map, ready for visualization and analysis.
October 6th - Editing Spatial Data in ArcGIS Pro
Until we perfect that magic “extract all those lines from this paper map” button we’re stuck using editing tools to get that job done. If you’re lucky, someone else has done the work to create your points, lines, and polygons but maybe they need your magic touch to make them better. This session shows you how to create and modify vector features in ArcGIS Pro. We’ll explore tools to create new points, lines, and polygons and to edit existing datasets.
October 13th - Easy Demographics: ArcGIS Pro and Social Explorer
Need to make a quick demographic map? This workshop will show you how easily navigate Social Explorer. This powerful online application makes it easy to create maps with contemporary and historic census data and religious information.
October 20th - Introduction to ArcGIS Online
With ArcGIS Online, you can use and create maps and scenes, access ready-to-use maps, layers and analytics, publish data as web layers, collaborate and share, access maps from any device, make maps with your spreadsheet data, customize the ArcGIS Online website, and view status reports.
October 27th - ArcGIS Story Maps
ArcGIS StoryMaps is a spatially enabled website/application builder that allows you to add narrative and multimedia context to your ArcGIS Online maps (or locational context to your narrative and multimedia content, depending on how your brain works). Whether telling a story, giving a tour or comparing historical maps, ArcGIS StoryMaps is an easy-to-use builder that creates polished presentations.