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GAO Study Highlights Need for Funding Geography Education

K-12 Geography Proficiency Levels Have Not Improved Since 1994

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) released an important report last week that underscores the need for funding K-12 geography education in the United States. The Association of American Geographers (AAG) provided substantial input to GAO during their process of developing this report.

“The GAO report is another clarion call for the need to support geography education in the U.S.,” said AAG Executive Director Douglas Richardson. “Geography is integral to nearly all aspects of life today, ranging from our economy to our foreign policy.”

AAG President Sarah Bednarz added, “This important and timely study reinforces our efforts to promote the importance of K-12 geography education in preparing American students for rapidly-growing job fields.”

The report includes a U.S. Department of Labor projection that the employment of specialists in geography, or geographers, is expected to grow 29 percent from 2012 to 2022—much faster than the average 11 percent growth for all occupations.

According to a statement from GAO, “The growing use of geographic information and location-based technology across multiple sectors of the American economy has prompted questions about whether K-12 students’ skills and exposure to geography are adequate for current and future workforce needs.” GAO conducted this study pursuant to a provision outlined in Senate Report 113-71, which calls for “GAO to report on the status of geography education and challenges elementary and secondary schools face in providing geography education with limited resources.”

The report’s cover letter to U.S. Senators Roy Blunt and Patty Murray emphasized that, “Geographic information and geospatial, or location-based, technologies are growing sectors of the American economy, influencing almost every facet of modern life, from tracking lost cell phones to monitoring disease outbreaks like Ebola. The emergence of these technologies has increased demand for workers who can analyze and interpret geographic information. Research suggests that K-12 education is critically important for learning the fundamentals of geography, which is the study of places and the relationship between people and their environment.”

The study’s findings validate the importance of the AAG Resolution Supporting K-12 Geography Education, which demonstrates the need for funding for K-12 geography as part of the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. The resolution has been endorsed by four former U.S. Secretaries of State; four former Defense Secretaries; 24 bipartisan incumbent Governors; and over 25 Fortune 500 companies. It can be accessed at: https://www.aag.org/resolution.

A copy of the GAO report can be retrieved from https://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-16-7. Questions about the report should be directed to Jacqueline M. Nowicki at (617) 788-0580 or nowickij [at] gao [dot] gov.

For more information, visit the AAG website at www.aag.org, or contact John Wertman, the AAG’s Senior Program Manager for Government Relations, at jwertman [at] aag [dot] org.

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New Books for Geographers

New Books: October 2015

Every month the AAG compiles a list of newly-published books in geography and related areas. Some are selected for review in the AAG Review of Books.

Publishers are welcome to send new volumes to the Editor-in-Chief (Kent Mathewson, Editor-in-Chief, AAG Review of Books, Department of Geography and Anthropology, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803).

Anyone interested in reviewing these or other titles should also contact the Editor-in-Chief.

October, 2015

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Annual Meeting

A Taste of New Deal Alphabet Soup in San Francisco

One of several controversial panels at Coit Tower. A library scene painted by Bernard Zakheim, in which patron (fellow muralist John Langley Howard) pulls a copy of Das Kapital from the shelf. Photo: Shaina Potts for the Living New Deal. Mural: Bernard Zakheim

Coming to San Francisco for the annual meeting next spring will mean inevitably traversing a landscape transformed by the New Deal. For those landing at the San Francisco or Oakland Airports, The Works Progress Administration (WPA), Public Works Administration (PWA), and State Emergency Relief Administration (SERA) all had a hand in their growth into major airports. Crossing over the majestic western span of the Bay Bridge is to rely on the New Deal as well. In 1936 when it was completed at the hands of the WPA, the bridge was the longest suspension bridge in the country. From the bridge, many visitors quickly pick out one of the city’s most visible landmarks, Coit Tower, where the entire interior is covered in New Deal frescos. With funds from the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP), the New Deal’s first public arts program, twenty-six artists spent six months in 1934 creating murals of depression era life and the state’s history. The murals were carefully restored last year and are once again on view to the public as a monument not just to California but a historical moment when the federal government invested directly in the arts, infrastructure and its poorest citizens.

Pieces of San Francisco’s history, like that of Coit Tower, are relatively well known. But the extent of the structural and aesthetic improvements made to the city are just now being recovered by a team of researchers and volunteers at the Living New Deal project. Founded and directed by Berkeley Geographers Richard Walker and Gray Brechin (a longer history of the project is available on our website), the Living New Deal works to rediscover, catalog and map the sites of New Deal art and infrastructure. To many people’s surprise, there are no complete records of New Deal programs; this in part because of their emphasis on ending the Depression as quickly as possible, and in part because of long standing efforts to obscure the New Deal’s success in doing just that. Given the enormity of its scope, over the last decade the Living New Deal has grown into a national collaboration of geographers, researchers from disciplines ranging from art history to economics, students, many amateur historians and untold numbers of volunteers submitting information on what the “alphabet soup” of programs created in their regions. In the same spirit of serving the public good that defined the original New Deal, our group works to make all of the information gathered for our database and map freely available via the web, publications and frequent presentations around the country.

The Living New Deal’s origins in the Bay Area are reflected in the density of New Deal sites already uncovered in and around San Francisco. Those first years of research revealed that no corner of the city was left untouched by WPA, PWA, CWA, CCC or one of the other agencies. As shown on the project’s map, the city is literally dotted with parks, playgrounds, schools and public buildings, street and sewer improvements, murals, sculptures, and other works of art. Neighborhoods famous for other reasons turn up New Deal touches everywhere. A walk through the Castro includes sidewalks still stamped with WPA logos. Chinatown’s St. Marys square is home to a 14-foot tall statue of Sun Yat-Sen by the renowned sculptor Beniamino Bufano, paid for by the Federal Arts Project (FAP). Golden Gate Park is chock full of New Deal improvements that endless hippies, yuppies, and tourists have made use of for nearly eight decades without ever likely considering their origins. Federal funds flowed far beyond just the major cities however, even to Republican led communities like Berkeley (yes, it was a different place in the 1930s), where civic structures like the high school and post office are adorned with art extolling the public value of knowledge and beauty. Just slightly further afield are trails and open spaces made possible by the work of the Civilian Conservation Core (CCC), meant to provide even the most destitute Americans access to the therapeutic dimensions of the “great outdoors.” Of course many of those spaces are still readily accessible to us today. The list of New Deal sites that we take advantage of in the 21st century goes on and on, and grows with every passing week of new discoveries.

While the Living New Deal works to reveal and promote the legacy of work in the name of the public good, the archive and map make apparent that this legacy is in no way free of the problematic politics and mainstream thought of the time from which it emerged. From environmental destruction (note how much “reclaimed” land the airport occupies), to the racist representations and exclusions of indigenous peoples in art celebrating California’s colonial history, to the complicated first “progressive” efforts at public housing (coupled with policies that underwrote the mass suburbanization of whites), the Bay Area contains it all.

In juxtaposition to the relics we find abhorrent in the present, the city also contains projects so radical that they have been raising the ire of civic leaders and the “business community,” for decades; probably none more so than the murals at the Rincon Annex. Created by Russian born artist Anton Refregier, who “wanted to paint the past, not as a romantic backdrop, but as part of the living present, a present shaped by the trauma of depression, strikes, and impending war” (Brechin, 2013), the murals adorn the interior of a beautiful post-office building. The works themselves, however, depict a much more violent history underlying San Francisco’s history, beginning with Sir Francis Drake holding a bloodied sword (his hand infamously reappears emerging from a Nazi flag in a later panel, connecting the original conquest to the rise of Fascism), the murals continue on to show a much “truer” depiction of the Mission system, the beating of Chinese during anti-immigrant riots, the murder of striking workers, and the general hardship that befell many of San Francisco’s pre-war inhabitants. Despite many efforts to stop the murals from being produced in the first place and censorship, they are still on display at the building and open to the public—just a few blocks from the Ferry Building.

For those who will be at the conference, several current and former team members from the project will be on hand and always excited to discuss the New Deal. For those who would like to explore New Deal sites on their own, this is San Francisco, so there is of course “an app for that.” Local public media network KQED worked with the Living New Deal and California Historical Society to create an iPhone and Android app called “Let’s Get Lost,” which features interactive tours of both Coit Tower and Rincon Annex Murals. Or, for the adventurous geographers looking to get out and explore, an actual print map of a self-guided tour of New Deal sites in San Francisco is available.

Geographers who won’t be attending the meeting are still able to explore the legacies of the New Deal in their own regions via the project’s website and interactive map. The Living New Deal has just begun to scratch the surface of what was created by the alphabet soup of federal projects, and strongly encourages interested persons with knowledge of unlisted or incomplete entries for their area to be in touch! Whether in the Bay, another town, or the vast rural and wilderness spaces of the US, the Living New Deal hopes our project will encourage our fellow geographers to look for clues to how the New Deal continues to shape not just the history of the country but the places we inhabit every day.

Alex Tarr is the former project manager at the Living New Deal project and currently the Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in Spatial Humanities at the Rice University Humanities Research Center. He received his PhD in geography from the University of California, Berkeley in 2015. A more complete list of the many geographers who have contributed to the Living New Deal is available on the website.

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Priya Bhame
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Vincent P. Gutowski

Vince Gutowski, popular and long-time faculty member at Eastern Illinois University, with diverse interests across applied geography, passed away suddenly on October 5, 2015, aged 70.

Vincent Peter Gutowski was born on February 1, 1945, in Jersey City, NJ. His father, Chester, celebrated the birth of his first son from aboard a ship somewhere in the Pacific where he was on wartime service with the U.S. Coast Guard.

Following the war, the Gutowskis lived in Pittsburgh, PA. Vince graduated from South Catholic High School in 1962 then served in the U.S. Navy. This included time in Panama at Coco Solo, the submarine and naval air base in the Canal Zone. There he met Pamela Maedl, whose father spent most of his career as a high school teacher in the Zone. They married in 1971 in California.

After his military service, Gutowski continued with his education, receiving a B.A. in 1974 and an M.A. in 1977 both from California State University Northridge. He then moved back to his home city for a PhD at the University of Pittsburgh in the Department of Geology and Planetary Science, completing it in 1987.

Much of his early work was on fluvial environments, with publications on topics including stream terraces, riverbank erosion, depositional zones, riverside land use, urban water consumption, and changing urban waterfronts.

Gutowski joined the Department of Geology and Geography at Eastern Illinois University (EIU) in 1983 where he stayed until retirement in 2010. He had a broad spectrum of research and teaching interests including geomorphology, environmental studies, field methods, cartography and applied geography.

The university’s geography major was withdrawn just after his arrival at EIU but Gutowski was credited with its revival into a thriving and growing program. He was a committed teacher, following the example of his own teachers in encouraging his students to do more than just take classes. He made his students aware of their importance and thrived on guiding those who had a zeal for learning. He encouraged students to do research; in fact all of his own research projects had student involvement. His appreciation for student scholarship at the undergraduate level allowed him to successfully steer many into graduate school and he was instrumental in helping his students receive scholarships.

Gutowski led students on field trips throughout the United States, including the southern Appalachians, the Coastal Plain and the Southwest. He also demonstrated the importance of balancing studies with social gatherings, frequently hosting students at his home. Many former students will remember Gutowski as their friend, confidant and greatest advocate, while approaching his duties in a laid-back, yet academically-responsible manner.

As GIS emerged as a geographic tool, he embraced it for his continuing interests in fluvial geomorphology and paleogeography. In the latter field of scholarship, he spent over a decade on field-based investigations – digging through layers of soil, and sorting through seeds and snail shells – to construct a portrait of the climate and ecology of eastern Illinois 20,000 years ago.

He was also involved in a number of projects for local governments in Illinois – Charleston, Coles County and Decatur – applying GIS for regional planning, infrastructure mapping, and water resource management.

He was deeply committed to local environmental issues, including serving on the Embarras River Management Association’s board of directors and as chair of the council of the Illinois Department of Natural Resources Conservation 2000 Program.

Gutowski became a member of the AAG in 1978. He regularly attended the Annual Meeting and was actively involved in the West Lakes Regional Division, as well as a number of Specialty Groups.

During his career at EIU, Gutowski received numerous university awards for his teaching, research and service, including the Luis Clay Mendez Distinguished Service Award in 2008 for his outstanding dedication to the university, his profession, and the community-at-large. On receipt of awards, Gutowski always credited those who had mentored him. A hallmark of his scholarly work, publications and consultancy projects was collaboration, testament to his inclusive approach.

Gutowski generously used personal funds made via his consulting work to buy equipment for student use in EIU laboratories. He and his wife also established the Vincent P. and Pamela R. Gutowski Fund to support students majoring in geography who show outstanding scholarship and dedication.

After retirement, Gutowski remained active in the department at EIU and in the community, including a project to locate and map a lost cemetery. In 1922, non-union miners were killed during the famous Herrin Massacre in Southern Illinois. Gutowski, along with his long-term collaborator Steve Di Naso, and a research team used a variety of geospatial techniques along with detective work to uncover the victims who had been buried in an unmarked potter’s field thereby helping to bring closure to a divisive chapter in the community’s history. Their accomplishments were recognized with a Superior Achievement Award from the Illinois State Historical Society.

He also spent time in retirement playing golf and on the family property along Kickapoo Creek, planting and tending to thousands of trees.

Vince Gutowski was highly respected and regarded by his colleagues and students alike. Fellow EUI geographer, Godson Obia, described him as “a stellar academic and a great person,” remarking on how much he gave to his students and department. He will also be greatly missed by his family. He predeceased his siblings – two brothers and a sister – and also leaves behind Pam, his loving wife of 44 years, their three children, Jennifer, Carl and Frank, and four grandchildren.

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Thriving in a Time of Disruption in Higher Education: A Featured Theme at AAG 2016

Call for Participation
AAG Annual Meeting
San Francisco, California
March 29 – April 2, 2016

For its 2016 Annual Meeting in San Francisco, the AAG is welcoming abstracts and organized session proposals on the theme of Thriving in a Time of Disruption in Higher Education.

Context: This is a challenging time to be engaged in scholarship in higher education. Shrinking state budgets and rising tuition raise concerns about the affordability—and importance–of college. Graduate education is facing serious criticism and evaluation; is the academy preparing students valued by society or merely reproducing itself? Skepticism by some members of Congress about the value of social and behavioral sciences threaten research funding at the same time universities are placing increased importance on grantsmanship for promotion and tenure. A cornerstone of education, tenure, is under attack. Fundamental notions of shared governance and academic freedom are under reconsideration. Increasingly our status as individual scholars and collective departments is measured and benchmarked by external organizations using criteria we may not even be aware of—or value.

This plays out in different ways for the discipline of geography. Eight actions emerge as key to healthy geography departments: teach, promote, build, innovate, nurture, manage, reflect, and envision. Departments must have a clear (and shared) vision of what and who they are and be prepared to work to build toward that vision. This may require innovation, a euphemism for change, something that is never easy. Departments need leaders who manage effectively and who are willing to nurture their colleagues, enabling them to succeed across different stages of their careers. Healthy geography departments care about recruiting and retaining students and majors through compelling teaching that enriches the lives of the students they touch. Strong departments build through fund raising, nurturing alumni, and entrepreneurship. Finally, healthy departments take the time to reflect, to assess, plan, and refocus as needed, together.

Sessions: To reflect on these ideas, the AAG invites sessions focused on the notion of building the discipline broadly through the development of healthy departments. A second pathway to disciplinary health is through strong research-based teaching and institutional action. Especially appropriate would be papers and sessions focused on topics such as:

  • Impactful geographical research
  • Entrepreneurship and alumnae development strategies
  • Innovations in undergraduate and graduate education
  • Research in geographic and spatial thinking
  • Innovations in K-12 education
  • Internationalization of geography education

For each of the activities below, we seek a diverse group of individuals representing a range of experiences with these topics. If interested, please follow the specified procedures.

RESEARCH PAPERS

AAG staff will be organizing several paper sessions on research topics related to this theme. To present in one of these sessions:

  • Register for the conference at aag.org/annualmeeting/register
  • During abstract submission select “paper” as the abstract type
  • After entering your abstract, select Higher Education as the Primary Topic
  • In the space for “Special Request” add a note that the abstract submitted is intended for the “Thriving in a Time of Disruption in Higher Education” theme
  • When you receive confirmation of a successful abstract submission, please then forward this confirmation to: geoeducation [at] aag [dot] org.

The abstract deadline is October 29, 2015.

ILLUSTRATED PAPER SESSIONS

AAG staff will also be organizing practice-oriented illustrated paper sessions intended to disseminate information about effective approaches to geography education in the context of this theme. An illustrated paper is a short oral summary of problem, data, method, and findings presented in poster format, followed by a one-on-one or small group discussion with interested listeners. Each presenter will post illustrations and other relevant materials on a poster board supplied by the AAG. All oral summaries will be given at the beginning of each session before participants disperse to the poster boards around the room. To present in one of these sessions:

  • Register for the conference at aag.org/annualmeeting/register
  • During abstract submission select “paper” as the abstract type
  • After entering your abstract, select Higher Education as the Primary Topic
  • In the space for “Special Request” add a note that the abstract submitted is intended for the “Thriving in a Time of Disruption in Higher Education” theme
  • When you receive confirmation of a successful abstract submission, please then forward this confirmation to: geoeducation [at] aag [dot] org.

The abstract deadline is October 29, 2015.

ORGANIZED SESSIONS

To submit an organized session to this theme please forward your session confirmation email to geoeducation [at] aag [dot] org by October 29, 2015. 

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Annual Meeting

International Geography and Urban Health Symposium at the AAG Annual Meeting

A Research Symposium organized by:
International Society for Urban Health (ISUH) and Association of American Geographers (AAG)

Other Co-Sponsors:

  • The International Geospatial Health Research Network (IGHRN)
  • The New York Academy of Medicine (NYAM)
  • The AAG Health and Medical Geography Specialty Group
  • The AAG Urban Geography Specialty Group

Where: At the Joint Meetings of the AAG and International Society of Urban Health (ISUH)

  • AAG Annual Meeting, San Francisco: March 29-April 2, 2016
  • ISUH Annual Meeting, San Francisco: April 1-4, 2016
  • Joint ISUH and AAG Geography and Urban Health Symposium, San Francisco: April 1-2, 2016
    Photo Credit: Healthnewsnet via Compfight cc

     

    The International Society for Urban Health and the Association of American Geographers are pleased to announce a joint international symposium on Geography and Urban Health, to foster inter-disciplinary and international collaborations in team science, geodesign for healthy urban environments, GIScience advances in health research and technology transfer, and geographic or biomedical research which addresses global health needs.

     

    Sessions for the Joint ISUH and AAG Symposium will be held on Friday, April 1 and Saturday, April 2 within the 2016 AAG Annual Meeting in San Francisco. The AAG Annual Meeting will begin on March 29, 2016. We seek to bring together national and international scholars, practitioners, and policy makers from different specialties, institutions, sectors, and continents to share ideas, findings, methodologies, and technologies, and to establish, and strengthen personal connections, communication channels, and research collaborations and networks.

    On Friday, April 1, there will be a Joint Plenary Session that will have strong appeal to health geographers and urban health researchers, population health researchers, and biomedical researchers. The Plenary will be followed by a Reception for those attending the Plenary Session.

    We welcome papers on all aspects of urban and global health, as well as health and medical geography – most broadly defined – and their intersections with other branches of geography or GIScience. Topics may include but are not limited to:

    Research Collaborations

    • Scientific collaborations in geography and urban health
    • urban health and heath geography
    • Collaborating to advance global urban health policy

    Environmental Health

    • Disease mapping
    • Assessment of the impact of environmental exposures (physical and/or social) on health
    • Exposure monitoring utilizing real-time GPS/GIS methods
    • EcoGeographic genetic epidemiology: gene-environment interactions
    • Disease ecologies

    Global or International Health

    • Health issues in the Global South
    • Development and health
    • Health development and displaced populations
    • International perspectives on maternal and child health

    Infectious and Communicable Diseases

    • Infectious diseases and their relations to climate change
    • Spatiotemporal modeling of infectious and communicable diseases

    Health Behaviors

    • Mobilities and health
    • Spatial analysis of substance abuse and treatment
    • Social environments and mental health

    Healthcare Service

    • Accessibility of healthcare services and its optimization
    • Healthcare provision, access, and utilization
    • Health disparities and inequalities
    • Global health research and public health initiatives

    Methodologies and Technologies

    • Methodological issues in health research (e.g., MAUP, UGCoP)
    • Spatial uncertainties in health studies
    • CyberGIS and high performance computing in health studies
    • Geospatial big data and health
    • Crowd sourcing of geospatial data for health research
    • mHealth and global health service delivery initiatives

    To submit an abstract to this symposium:

    • Register for the conference at https://www.aag.org/cs/annualmeeting/register
    • During abstract submission select “Geography and Urban Health” as the Primary Topic
    • In the space for “Special Request” add a note that the abstract submitted is intended for the Geography and Urban Health Symposium
    • When you receive confirmation of a successful abstract submission, please then forward this confirmation to: geohealth [at] aag [dot] org

    To submit a session to this symposium please forward your session confirmation email to geohealth [at] aag [dot] org.

    The abstract deadline for papers submitted to this symposium is October 29, 2015.

    Registration in either conference allows access to BOTH conferences (AAG and ISUH) as well as the joint plenary.

    For more information, please visit www.aag.org/cs/annualmeeting or contact members of the Symposium’s Scientific Committee at geohealth [at] aag [dot] org.

    Scientific Committee of the Joint AAG-ISUH Geography and Urban Health Symposium:

    Yonette Thomas (Chair) (Senior Advisor, AAG; Scientific Advisor on Urban Health to the New York Academy of Medicine)

    Mei-Po Kwan (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA)

    Mark Rosenberg (Queens University, Canada)

    Alex Ross (WHO Center for Health Development, Kobe, Japan)

    Gerard Salem (University of Paris Nanterre, France)

    Xun Shi (Dartmouth College, USA)

    Susan Thompson (The University of New South Wales, Australia)

    David Vlahov (University of California, San Francisco, USA)

    Blaise Nguendo Yongsi (University of Yaounde II, Sao, Cameroon)

     

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Elizabeth J. Leppman

Elizabeth Leppman, a respected geographer with broad interests across cultural and historical geography, latterly at Walden University, passed away on September 21, 2015, at the age of 71, after a struggle with cancer.

Elizabeth Jane Leppman was born on December 6, 1943, in Chicago, although she lived in Moorestown, NJ, during most of her childhood. Her father was a German immigrant and she remembered a steady stream of international visitors to their home, sparking an early interest in geography.

After receiving a B.A. from Middlebury College she started her career as a cartographer with Rand McNally. She later received a master’s degree from York University in Toronto and a doctorate from the University of Georgia.

Her PhD thesis, completed in 1997, was entitled “Choices in the Rice Bowl: Geography of Diet in Liaoning Province, China.” Her study examined the difference in nutritional levels and quality of food between city and countryside dwellers. Despite increasing migration to the cities, a reduction in the rural-urban divide, and the modernization of peasant lifestyles, she observed a clear distinction in food behavior between the city and countryside. The work was later published as a book Changing Rice Bowl: Economic Development and Diet in China (2005).

Leppman’s interest in the geography of food and diet continued, along with interests in cultural geography and the geography of religion, the latter spanning religious and sacred landscapes, especially in Appalachia and Central Minnesota, and missions, especially in China and Appalachia, and their worldview. She wrote various scholarly articles and book chapters in each of these fields.

Over the years, Leppman had teaching appointments at Millersville University in Pennsylvania, Miami University of Ohio, St. Cloud State University in Minnesota, the University of Kentucky and Eastern Kentucky University. Most recently she was on the faculty at Walden University where she taught geography and other social science courses.

She was committed to geography education and had a key role in the writing and editing of a number of textbooks, atlases and handbooks for teachers. These included: Teaching Map and Globe Skills, K-6: A Handbook (1982), Working with Historical Maps: Integrating Geography and History Skills (1997), the Student Atlas of World Politics, 6th edition (2004) co-authored with John Allen, Australia and the Pacific (2005), and Exploring Geography Through Primary Sources (2011).

Leppman served terms as editor of the Journal of Geography, published by the National Council for Geographic Education, and also as editor of Geography of Religions and Belief Systems, the online journal of the AAG’s specialty group.

She was a member of the AAG since 1975. Her involvement in a diverse range of specialty groups – including China, Cultural Geography, Geography of Religions and Belief Systems, Health and Medical Geography, Historical Geography, Political Geography, and Study of the American South – reflected her varied interests within geography.

Her geographic passions spilled over into the rest of her life. She enjoyed travel, photography, Chinese art and culture, local and state history, and many other interests. She was also a devoted parishioner in Episcopal churches in the many communities where she lived, latterly in Lexington, KY, where she was involved with Good Shepherd Episcopal Church and was a committed volunteer at Mission Lexington, among other community activities.

Leppman accomplished much and liked to keep busy. Her family said: “Elizabeth’s life was always dominated by her present list of projects and by future even more ambitious ones…”

She is survived by her brother John, daughter Karen, son Bradford, grandchildren Tyler and Kelsey, and cat Peaches.

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New Books for Geographers

New Books: September 2015

Every month the AAG compiles a list of newly-published books in geography and related areas. Some are selected for review in the AAG Review of Books.

Publishers are welcome to send new volumes to the Editor-in-Chief (Kent Mathewson, Editor-in-Chief, AAG Review of Books, Department of Geography and Anthropology, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803).

Anyone interested in reviewing these or other titles should also contact the Editor-in-Chief.

September, 2015

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Piash Debnath Interns at AAG for Fall Semester

Piash Debnath is a senior at George Mason University double majoring in geography and environmental and sustainabilities studies. He’s currently the geography department’s first and only learning assistant (LA). As an LA, he co-teaches an undergraduate geography class giving students exposure to and better understanding of the discipline allowing them to possibly pursue a minor or major. After graduating, he plans to pursue a masters in geographic and cartographic sciences and a graduate certificate in environmental GIS and biodiversity conservation. He hopes to work for a non-profit that utilizes GIS technology in environmental issues. Currently, he’s a member of Gamma Theta Upsilon and the president of the Bengali Patriots Association. Born and raised in Bangladesh, he wants to be able to use his skills to create maps to help protect the environment.

In his spare time he enjoys playing tennis, volunteering at Novant Prince William hospital and exploring the wilderness.

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Kelsey Taylor Joins AAG Staff as Research Assistant

The AAG  is pleased to announce that Kelsey Taylor has joined the association staff as a Research Assistant at its headquarters in Washington, D.C. Kelsey has served as an intern at the association for the previous three semesters while completing her undergraduate degree and has worked on a number of grant projects during her time at the AAG. In her new role, she will contribute to AAG research projects and preparation for the 2016 Annual Meeting in San Francisco.

Kelsey holds a bachelor’s degree in environmental studies and philosophy from The George Washington University and is currently in her first year of GWU’s geography master’s program. While her background is primarily focused in physical geography, her current research interests include urban sustainability, urban planning, political geography, and mapmaking. In addition to her work at the AAG, Kelsey serves as a graduate teaching assistant for a writing-intensive undergraduate course in urban sustainability and an introductory course in human geography.

Outside of her academic interests, Kelsey enjoys indoor and outdoor rock climbing, hiking and continuing to explore everything Washington, D.C. has to offer.

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AAG Staff
AAG Staff