UCGIS Reasearch Agenda

A Research Agenda for Geographic Information Science
Robert McMaster and E. Lynn Usery, 2004, published by Taylor & Francis, distributed by CRC Press

Hyperlinks are to short documents providing updates to the state-of-the-art on the topic since the 2004 publication of the book.

• Introduction to the UCGIS Research Agenda
• Spatial Data Acquisition and Integration
• Cognition of Geographic Information
• Scale
• Extensions to Geographic Representations
• Spatial Analysis and Modeling in a GIS Environment
• Research Issues on Uncertainty in Geographic Data and GIS-Based Analysis (forthcoming)
• The Future of the Spatial Information Infrastructure
• Distributed and Mobile Computing
• GIS and Society: Interrelation, Integration, and Transformation
• Geographic Visualization
• Ontological Foundations for Geographic Information Science
• Remotely-Acquired Data and Information in GIScience (update folds in with Ch. 2, Spatial Data Aquisition and Integration)
• Geospatial Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery
• Postscript on the UCGIS and Research

UCGIS Research Agenda Background

Next Steps for UCGIS Research Agenda
Background about Grand Challenges for GIScience Research

As background to this grand challenges activity, the UCGIS community articulated and elucidated 14 research priorities over the period 1996 and 2004 that are published in A Research Agenda for Geographic Information Science (edited by Robert McMaster and E. Lynn Usery, 2005, CRC Press). In this next steps activity for the research agenda, UCGIS is not out to redevelop those research priorities, but perhaps to refine a collection of research topics that emerge from those priorities. Perhaps some of the priorities have become more significant while others have not. Perhaps some grand challenges are cross-cutting issues and perhaps not.

At the 2006 Summer Assembly in Vancouver, Washington, the University Consortium for Geographic Information Science (UCGIS) embarked upon a “Next Steps in the UCGIS Research Agenda” process. Several sessions made reference to a logical next step for identifying grand challenges in GIScience research. The UCGIS Research Committee (Tim Nyerges, chair, and Dawn Wright, Co-chair) in collaboration with the UCGIS Communications Committee (Jane Read, Chair) agreed to host a discussion forum about grand challenges for GIScience research that would facilitate next steps.

The Research Committee and the Communication Committee anticipate that a Next Steps for Grand Challenges Discussion Forum will culminate with identifying a collection of “X” grand challenges to be further discussed at the 2007 UCGIS Summer Assembly. We also expect this process to elucidate the reasons why the grand challenges contributed during the process are the most significant according to the UCGIS group who participated in the discussion forum.

This web page outlines a structured discussion forum for making the next steps idea an operational process. A structured discussion forum involves a sequence of participatory activities that enable a participatory knowledge building effort. It is meant to be efficient, effective, and equitable (and overall participatory democratic) in as many ways as possible. Some familiar structured discussion forums can be Nominal Group Technique, Delphi Process, Technology of Participation™, Deliberative Polling™, and Citizen Jury™. Each forum provides a way to sequence a series of discussions to enable an efficient, effective and equitable process as well as outcome. The results are commonly a consensus of all who contribute, whether it is 100% consensus is up to those who participate and the moderator who facilitates the process. Having undertaken extensive research on these processes over the past several years, we outline a process synthesized from among the best aspects of those more popular processes. All UCGIS members are welcome to take part in the Grand Challenges Disucssion Forum.

UCGIS Research Grand Challenges

Next Steps for UCGIS Research Agenda
Grand Challenges Structured Discussion Forum

Our goal for the overall process:
What are the top “X” grand challenges for GIScience research? The number “X” will be agreed upon during the discussion forum. If you are uneasy with “X” then consider “5” for practical purposes.

First discussion session – closes January 15, 2007 12 midnight PST.

1. What is a grand challenge?

• Definition from a credible source
• Criteria for inclusion
• Examples from other areas

Perhaps a grand challenge involves cross-cutting issues among the research priorities articulated in the UCGIS Research Agenda for GIScience book edited by R. McMaster and E. Lynn Usery (2005 CRC Press)?

Second discussion session - closes February 15, 2007 12 midnight PST.

2. Based on your understanding of the idea about grand challenges as discussed in the previous session, what do you believe is/are grand challenge(s) for GIScience research? Describe to others why you think your contribution is a good example. You can use the material in section 1 to make the argument, and provide any other justification. You can suggest as many challenges as you like.

Third discussion session – closes March 15, 2007 12 midnight PST.

3. Based on the grand challenges contributed to the previous session, what similarities among the challenges can we find to reduce our set? Let’s cluster them into groups. Sort them into groups to find similarities and reduce the numbers so we can bring more focus.

Fourth discussion session – April 15, 2007 12 midnight PST.

4. Based on the clustered contributions can you team with others to write up brief position paper(s) about the grand challenge(s) you find in common? The shorter the position paper the more thought must go into the words provided.This will involve a group editing process no doubt and can be done outside of the discussion activity. We will endeavor to find appropriate cybertools to support this editing process.

Fifth discussion session – May 15, 2007 12 midnight PST.

5. Do you understand the grand challenge contributions?
   What needs to be clarified? Members can pose questions about any and all of the grand challenges. The research committee will determine the appropriateness of the questions begging for answers. The research the research committee will do this is to address the “newcomer” syndrome. That is, some one who joins the process at this step, and wants to revisit everything without doing homework. However, we seriously do want to know what is not understood?

Sixth discussion session - June 15, 2007 12 midnight PST.

6. What are the top five grand challenges?
   Delegates are asked to vote the top-five grand challenges. All member institutions will be given two “ranked votes” as per council voting guidelines. From this result we will obtain a ranked list of all grand challenges, and thus be able to discuss the top “X” grand challenges to put forward for publication. We then discuss these grand challenges and provide reason for why these “X” are suitable for putting forward. The number does not have to be five, but we do need to provide a suitable number for communicating to US GIScience community and to the world about a refined research agenda.