51ÁÔĆć

Alumni News: Jonathan Burkham, PhD ’12

Jonathan Burkham, PhD ’12: I am pleased to say that I have made a fairly seamless transition to an Assistant Professorship at UW-Whitewater. Props to the professors, instructors, staff and grad students at 51ÁÔĆć Geography for helping me realize my skills as an educator, researcher, and, I would like to think, critical thinker! I now have the pleasure of opening young minds to the world of development geography, migration studies, and Milwaukee’s urban geography, which is, surprisingly, unexplored territory for many.

In addition to my standard lecture classes I recently co-taught a class that included a two-week study component in Oaxaca, Mexico. Oh, Mexico, my love for you never tires. Speaking of Mexico and Milwaukee, I am continuing my transnational ethnography into the economic and social ties between Milwaukee and a small village in Jalisco, Mexico. This summer, I will be researching the so-called “skills gap” between employment opportunities and workers in local industry, with a particular interest in the role Milwaukee’s burgeoning Latino and Mexican migrant population play in the city’s highly-segmented labor market.

I also had the opportunity to travel to Ethiopia last year to visit my (now) wife’s family. Our trip included a five day hike in the Ethiopian highlands complete with overnight stays at local tukuls (thatched-roof, adobe huts) where we danced and drank tej (honey wine) into the night. I hope to open up a new line of research on the Ethiopian “developmental state” in the future. But, for now, my feet are firmly planted in Wisconsin.

51ÁÔĆć Geography Welcomes Audrey Kobayashi and Harold M. Rose

For our first spring 2014 Harold and Florence Mayer Lecture, we were honored not only to welcome distinguished geographer Audrey Kobayashi, but also to have present in our audience 51ÁÔĆć Geography Professor Emeritus, Harold M. Rose. Dr. Rose’s foundational work on racial discrimination and segregation challenged urban geographers to consider the ghetto as produced through both spatial and social processes. His scholarship established that examining segregation was not just about mapping the distribution of racial groups across the urban landscape, but also about understanding the social processes and attitudes about race that produced those patterns.

Far ahead of what we, as a discipline, know today about the mass incarceration of African Americans and the state abandonment that has further entrenched racial and class segregation in cities, Professor Rose urged geographers to address the urgent social problems producing and reinforcing racialized urban geographies of despair and violence. The legacy of his work is paramount, and we were honored to announce the establishment of a new Harold M. Rose Lecture series that will emphasize topics of race and urban social justice, as a means to pay tribute to Professor Rose’s legacy to 51ÁÔĆć Geography, to the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and to the discipline of geography.

There are wonderful connections between Dr. Rose and our distinguished guest speaker, Audrey Kobayashi, whose scholarship has, in so many ways, contributed to understandings about race, racism, and anti-racism in geography. Professor Kobayashi joined us from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. She has co-edited important books on peace and armed conflict, immigrants in North American cities, as well as publishing extensively within – and serving as editor and on the editorial boards of – the premier journals within human geography. Professor Kobayashi’s work has not only generated new theoretical approaches to race, anti-racist research, and pedagogy; it has also problematized the whiteness of the discipline and underscored the fundamental difference that race makes within the geographic enterprise. As someone working in the areas of critical geographies of race and feminist geography, I know I am just one of many, many scholars who can attest to the influence of Professor Kobayashi’s work on my own research and activism within geography. It was a true honor to have present with us two pioneering past-presidents of the AAG who have done so much to help us understand and challenge racism within and beyond the discipline.

Alumni: Jessica Helgesen, BA ’12

Jessica Helgesen, BA ’12: After graduation, I searched for positions related to environmental geography, planning, and community engagement that incorporated the opportunity to use my Spanish. My overall goal was to find a position that would help me gain more experience before heading to graduate school or participating in the Peace Corps.

Shortly after graduation, I had the opportunity to work in Madison, WI for about 1.5 years at Dane County Parent Council, Inc. as a Bilingual Family Outreach Worker (FOW) at the Preschool Enrichment Program (PEP) located at the East Madison Community Center. I worked with many Spanish-speaking families, improving my Spanish skills, and I learned how to better engage low-income and diverse communities. With a background in Environmental Geography and Urban Studies, I decided to complete a Family Service Credential to provide more effective social services to the Head Start Families. Working in Head Start as FOW had its challenges and rewards, but I rarely delved into the environmental realm. I really wanted to use my degrees I received at 51ÁÔĆć and follow my dream to mend and/or create sustainable regions.

To take a step towards the latter dream, I applied to the Peace Corps. Starting mid-March 2014, I will travel to Mexico to serve with the Peace Corps, participating in a project focusing on Environment and Natural Resource Management as a Geographic Information Systems (GIS) /Information Technology Specialist. After three months of training, the Peace Corps officials will place each volunteer to a specific urban or rural location in central or southern Mexico. I will establish relationships with the community and other important stakeholders and analyze the GIS needs of the host agency and provide assistance with these said needs to help empower the community/agency, among other tasks. In training, I will receive more specific guidance on the needs within the country in regards to the project.

I am excited to partake in a new adventure with Peace Corps. Along with other opportunities, the Geography Department specifically helped me prepare for international experiences via my undergraduate thesis, fieldwork, and multiple international immersions.

Student News: Katie Williams

Katie Williams – PhD student

Research interests: I study ecosystem approaches to environmental restoration in three “toxic hotspots” designatedas Great Lakes Areas of Concern: St. Louis River (Duluth, Minnesota/Superior, Wisconsin), St. Marys River (Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan/Ontario, Canada), and Milwaukee Estuary. More specifically, I look at how stakeholders and the public participate in the processes of remediating and restoring these degraded areas, as well as the opportunities for creating community around natural resources.

Alumni: Patrick Gaertner, BA ’84

Patrick Gaertner, BA ’84, is currently a principal consultant with the Lucidity Consulting Group, Dallas, but lives in Melbourne Beach, Florida. He provides consulting and implementation services for utility companies implementing Oracle WAM (Work and Asset Management) and Oracle MWM (Mobile Workforce Management) products.

After graduation, Pat worked briefly with Mark Hurd Aerial Surveys in Minneapolis, scribing digital terrain maps for the Department of Defense. After about a year, he moved back to Milwaukee and began his career working within the GIS industry and utility companies. For the next 13 years, Pat worked primarily as Consultant and Project Manager implementing Intergraph FRAMME projects.

In 1998, Pat moved away from working with the primary mapping applications to work with OMS (Outage Management Systems) and Mobile Workforce applications. With the advance in digital technologies, computerized customer records and streamlining work applications for field crews, it was an easy move into implementing new solutions for utility operations. Pat’s work has been dedicated to this field since the late 1990’s.

In 2008, Pat moved from Wisconsin to Florida to work with GE as an OMS/DMS Commercial Manager to work with GE’s Smallworld PowerOn application and its move to Smart Grid technology. After two plus years with GE, Pat left and has since gone back to working with Oracle products and applications.

When he isn’t on a plane traveling to customer locations, Pat enjoys personal traveling, promoting and supporting local eco-tourism activities, surfing, and an occasional round of golf. His work has taken him to Nepal, Australia, Brazil, Scotland, Costa Rica, Jamaica and various other countries. Over the next few years, he plans to increase his activities in supporting eco-tourism activities locally and internationally in the Americas.

Student News: Wenliang Li

Wenliang Li – PhD Student

Research interests: Estimating large-scale urban impervious surfaces distribution (such as Wisconsin) and the corresponding environmental effect (e.g. hydrological effect,urban heat island, etc.); examining the driving forces of rapid urbanization, modeling and predicting urbanization process and its impact on surrounding environment and ecosystem

Tropical Fieldwork Team (Geog 654): Belize 2014

A Tropical Fieldwork team (Geog 654) was in Belize from February 15 through March 4, studying (eco)tourism in the karst of the western Cayo District. Based again at the Lower Dover Research Station in Unitedville, the team (Jake Bachman, Ellen Blaser, Mick Day, Courtney Gauert, Ed Glavin, Ashley Hoerz, Kate Sorensen and Tyler Willey) built on prior research by Liana Escott (MA, 2002) and the 2012 team in the former Cayo West Special Development Area, the establishment of which was prompted by the growth of the tourism business.

The research also built on the karst tourism work of Joe Rath (MA, 2000) and particularly on the dissertation of Jeff Allender (PhD, 1992), who provided important benchmark data during the early establishment of the local tourism sector.

The team documented the current state of the local ecotourism industry, based on San Ignacio/Santa Elena, visited principal tourist locations and surveyed numerous operators and participants. The information is currently being analyzed with a report due by the end of the spring semester. As always, Belize’s landscape and people provided a wonderful venue for the field research, and the Lower Dover Research Station facilitated the logistics.

Student News: Peter Armstrong

Peter Armstrong – MA student

Research interests: Understanding how influential urban institutions such as universities can better endorse bicycle commuting. I am interested in their potential relationship to influence better designed and more livable cities, where the bicycle is commonplace. The bicycle can be a rather convenient means to getting around, and to solving many of our modern societal issues, but it needs a safe infrastructure to optimize its use. Therefore, designing safe streets for bicycles not only encourages people to ride, but makes for safer and healthier cities for all. Through my research I hope to understand under what conditions will/do universities or cities decide to advocate for the bicycle?

Student News: Stephen Appel

Stephen Appel – MS student

Research interests: GIScience and Remote Sensing and their applications in conservation of natural resources, biogeography, and recently, phenology. I’ve also become increasingly interested in spatial data distribution, data standards, and public domain data and associated issues of accessibility.

Student News: Haijian Liu

Haijian Liu – PhD student

Research Interests: I’m interested in detecting tree species based on discrete LiDAR points alone and the fusion of LiDAR data and Hyperspectral data. By filtering the raw LiDAR data, a smoother image can be created. Then the location of each tree can be determined based on crown’s characteristics and the general tree species can be automatically identified. Hyperspectral data includes more spectral information comparing multiple spectral data and LiDAR data. The fusion of LiDAR data and Hyperspectral data has benefits in identifying specific species. My research focuses on classifying vegetation in urban area and identifying ash trees in Milwaukee. Ash trees account for a large proportion of forests in Wisconsin, but they are at the risk of being attacked by invading beetles so detecting ash trees is critical in developing forest protection plans.