Last year, Sete-Soluções e Tecnologia Ambiental, a Belo-Horizonte-based environmental consulting company, conducted its second GIS Day event — for a class of 80 16-year-olds — at the Instituto Padre Machado, a traditional elementary and high school in Belo Horizonte, Brazil’s third-largest.
“Our primary venue is high schools in our city,” said Raphael Foscarini, a geographer at Sete- Soluções e Tecnologia Ambiental, one of the biggest environmental consulting companies from Brazil, started in 1997.
According to Foscarini, the celebration was held in the school auditorium, where the students could ask quick questions and participate in GIS-themed activities. “We also gave away a few presents sent to us by Esri. The students loved receiving items about GIS Day,” he recalled.
The team—Foscarini, Ednilson Pereira, Gabriel Ferraz, and Leonardo Fernandes (all geographers who work with GIS at Sete)—explained the architecture of various shapes and rasters, as well as the concept that everything in GIS has a spatial reference on earth.
“We also explained how GIS allows us to combine many representations like images and maps to solve problems—and propose different solutions—faster than we could without GIS,” Foscarini recalled. “We showed them how we work with GIS at our company in support of our environmental studies.”
Sete has fully supported the team ever since Foscarini proposed hosting GIS Day events to his bosses two years ago. “I prepared a quick presentation. They liked and approved the idea as a way to both spread the word about GIS and the company itself,” he said.
In late August, Foscarini and team were still looking for a new school where they can host a GIS Day event and reach several neighborhoods in 2013. “Our idea is to never repeat any school, so we can disseminate better,” he said. “We prefer high school students because we can show this technology to those who are ready to make a career choice. Most of them have never heard about GIS, so our event is like a first contact with GIS. It’s a good initiative that can support the students’ career choice.”
The agenda for 2013 will consist of discussions about GIS basics, the team members’ job at Sete, and case studies and examples that will make the materials accessible to young students. At the end of the presentation, the team will answer questions and distribute giveaways provided by Esri.
“Our overriding message,” said Foscarini, “is that GIS is a tool that can be used by everyone every day to make our lives easier—no matter where in the world you live. Further, GIS can also become a career for those who enjoy working with this type of technology.”
Source: Esri
