Congressional Recommendation

Hello GIS practitioners... yes, that's you now.  Congratulations on the many thoughtful and considered responses to the blog questions.  The final blog should conclude your discourse.  In this blog please make your best recommendation to the US Congress regarding the viability of moving the management of the Valles Caldera by the National Park Service.  Please avoid passion and bias and stick to the facts as you have observed them.  Indicate, to the best of your ability the plusses and minuses of such a move.  Be as objective as possible.  You will compile this and all your other blog entries for part of your Valles Caldera report assignment.

What's so spatial about the Valles Caldera

You have done a wonderful job so far defining what the Valle Caldera is, why it's important, how it is supposed to be managed, and how effective that has been.  So now the question is, how can you as GISers help this situation.  To do that you must first think in spatial terms.  This, by the way, is considered one of the top two skills of GIS professionals along side problem solving and just ahead of presentation skills (graphical, spoken, and written).

If you think about it, much of the management of a large piece of land is related to its spatial dimension.   Pretty much every management factor is either affected by or affects the surroundings.  So as geographers you need to help manage the preserve by using your tools and skills.  In the following blog entries you will need the following:

• The management documents
• The GIS database (stored for you on blackboard)
• Discussions and interactions with your classmates.

How can you help?  You mission in this blog is to do the following to the best of your ability:

1. Answer the following question:  What are the spatial dimensions associated with the management requirements?   Hint: If you are trying to manage for horse trails, where are they?  Why are they where they are?  Should they be someplace else?  How to horse trails affect other uses?  The list is quite long so you might want to put a few down and wait for others to chime in.
2. Does the GIS database provide you with the ability to manage the caldera?  They obviously built this thing for something.  Has it been used effectively?  Why or why not do you think.
3. What layers might help them do their job more effectively?  Could you use the GIS to answer "what if" questions?  For example, if you are going to create a national park, where would you put things like a reception building, toilets, roads, trails.... etc.?  How do these affect the other mandates?  Hint: you can create your own layers in the geodatabase if you want to experiment and then post them here.

This is the second to last blog.  The final one basically these all together by asking you for your recommendations to Congress.  Happy Blogging!!!  Dr. DeMers

Management Effectiveness

Given what you have learned from the management factors blog begin discussing the degree to which the VCNT has and is currently satisfying the mandates.  Include your own perceptions, any evidence you have (both academic and public… e.g. news), and reasons for successes and failures.   You can’t know everything about what’s going on and will possibly have to make educated guesses but at least try to use logic and/or documentation (with references in APA style) to support your statements.  In short, try to avoid undocumented or illogical opinion.  This blog should spawn some lively discussion.  Please remember to be good to each other and stick to the posts and not the people.  If you disagree, explain why and see if you can persuade rather than bully the other person into your way of thinking.

Management Factors

You have now had a chance to explain what a caldera is – more specifically what the Valles Caldera is and explain why this feature is both unique and worthy of preservation and management.  When the Valles Caldera National Preserve was formed, its management was assigned, through legislation and a set of mandates and guidelines, to the Nature Preserve Trust (check this).   The documents behind this are all available to you on blackboard.  Unfortunately many of these documents are long and often difficult to read.  How about you use this Blog question to provide entries that explain, in your own words what the preserve is mandated to do.  You can list these if you wish, as a series of bullets but spend some time explaining them.  Also, as you read the posts of other students begin a dialogue that helps correct errors or misunderstanding, reasserts existing statements, adds to the lists of others (or yourself), and generally adds to the group’s understanding of what the Valles Caldera Trust is supposed to be doing.

What is the Valles Caldera National Preserve?

Hi 481 / 578 Learners

One assignment you have deals with informing the US Congress about the efficacy of switching control of the Valles Caldera National Preserve to the National Park Service. As with any place-based consulting position, your first task is to inform yourself about the study area, conditions under which the existing governance was formed, and legal mandates for the management agency.

Your first content-related blog entries should respond to THIS blog entry, not the opening blog entry. Here is your first set of questions. Answer them as completely as possible and use your own interpretation when necessary. While there are no completely correct or perfect answers there are good answers and bad answers... defensible answers and non-defensible answers. Read the appropriate Valles Caldera documentation provided in Blackboard, together with any other reading material you discover. Keep in mind you will be required to cite any information you use so that you avoid plagiarism. For help with correct citations the following is an excellent source:

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/section/2/10/

So, unless your statements are completely your own, or are independent conclusions, you MUST provide a citation for any borrowed ideas or quotations.

Below are your questions:

1. In your own words how the Valles Caldera was formed. Use diagrams, either your own or others (don't forget to citations!) to assist you in your description.
2. In your informed (yes this means reading and looking at pictures) opinion, what are the properties that make it worthy of preservation?
3. Evaluate, again based on informed opinion, whether you believe the Valles Caldera should be preserved. Why or why not?

As you encounter other posts, respond to those that inspire you, those that trouble you, those about which you have questions, or those that you just find intriguing. Please stay on topic (the answering of the three questions). Take time to argue, praise, contribute to, correct, and otherwise see to learn more about these questions. REMEMBER TO REPLY TO THE CONTENT NOT THE PERSON POSTING!!!!! Be kind, be gentle, be fair but most of all, be curious and focused on learning as much as you can.

Feel free to contact me directly via e-mail, skype or phone if you in need of help.

Dr. DeMers

Sign on to the blog.

Hi GIS learners. By the end of the semester you should have a good idea of what the Valles Caldera is, who manages it and how, what legislation is pending in congress, and how you can inform Congress on their legislation.

For now, sign on to the blog and make sure you can successfully post by just saying hello to everyone. Perhaps you can borrow some information from your Blackboard roster to let us know.

Happy Blogging.

Dr. DeMers