Welcome to a Gentle Introduction to GIS

We are pleased you’ve joined our course. We promise to make your time well spent and add value to your life. This course is called a Gentle Introduction to GIS and we mean to make it both gentle and meaningful. Gentle because we provide everything you need to succeed at learning the technology and meaningful since you are learning new skills that can help you at work or school.

GIS, or Geographical Information Systems, is both a well-established field of study first created in 1969, as well as a continually emerging technology. Advances in hardware and software occur continuously that make GIS more powerful and useful to an ever increasing number of people worldwide. Our goal is to help expand the use of GIS through education.

GIS is something we each experience daily. From the map app in your cell phone, to the GIS navigation in your auto, to the targeted ad you view on social media, GIS is the technology behind the map. In this course we will study both the discipline of GIS as well as the technology. The course has two distinct purposes. First, we provide you with the theoretical foundation to fully comprehend GIS. Second, we provide you with meaningful lab experience with the GIS application software to apply the theory.

Everything you need for the course is provided here. The theory lectures, the lab instructions, the data and instructional videos to guide you. How quickly you learn and how much you learn is up to you. We allow the student to control their own learning. We provide a well-designed course based upon a national standard. If you follow our outline, complete the lectures, labs, and exams, you will learn GIS well enough to be competent to build your own digital maps by the end of the course. Once you’ve mastered the basics of GIS through completion of this course, we will offer an additional four courses following this one that take you all the way to GIS Technician competency.

Going Further

Our course is designed to be self-directed, meaning you will be able to complete everything at your own pace with the materials provided. This course will not be instructor-led. We expect a high level of learner interaction will stimulate discussion among the participants. We offer a wealth of web-based resources in the course for further help. If you need an instructor-led version of this course you can alternatively sign up for our college course at this link. We also plan to offer an additional four instructor-led courses for those learners wishing an in-depth learning experience. These additional courses will all be offered totally online, instructor-led, with a Continuing Education certificate upon successful completion of each course. We will also offer a Certificate of Completion in Geospatial Technology for those students completing all five courses. The complete listing of courses includes:

1. GST 101 Introduction to Geospatial Technology Using QGIS—this introductory course to GIS theory and application for building digital maps.

2. GST 102 Spatial Analysis Using QGIS—covers the use of GIS for analyzing and solving real-world applications such as transportation logistics, product distribution and tracking, environment planning using GIS modeling and analysis techniques.

3. GST 103 Data Acquisition and Management Using QGIS—covers the creation, capture and management for geospatial data types including vector data and raster data, geo-database principles and best practices for data storage, archiving, distribution and security.

4. GST 104 Introduction to Cartography Using QGIS—covers the proper techniques for making meaningful and attractive maps which incorporated proper cartographic design; including scale, color, map legend and projection and coordinate systems.

5. GST 105 Introduction to Remote Sensing Using QGIS with GRASS—covers the use of raster data from remote-sensing platforms, such as LiDAR, satellite infrared, and other platforms. Incorporates the more powerful raster capabilities of GRASS to enhance QGIS functionality.

Disclaimer

QGIS is an independent open source software project created and operated under the auspices of the Open Source Geospatial Foundation (OSGeo). QGIS owns the copyright to the software and QGIS brand. QGIS and OSGeo grant the use of their software under Creative Commons Share Alike 3.0 license (CC BY-SA 3.0). The project personnel associated with these courses make no claim to ownership to QGIS or GRASS or any other application software used in these courses. We strongly support the adoption and use of QGIS, GRASS and other open source software and recommend our users do the same through their support of these projects.