Advanced GIS

3 Credits · Level: Graduate

Reducing the impacts of future disasters requires a comprehensive understanding of disaster risk in all its dimensions including vulnerability, capacity, exposure, hazard characteristics and the environment. Understanding how to measure and communicate disaster risk is a core principle for both global disaster risk reduction. Through all phases of disaster management, GIS provides tools and methods to examine and anticipate hazards and risks, protect lifelines, and enhance resilience, while helping to illustrate complex information to improve decision making. Risk analysis provides the factual basis for hazard mitigation planning and disaster risk reduction activities. In this course, students will learn fundamental concepts, tools, and methodologies for applied GIS analysis and visualization of hazards, risks, and vulnerabilities. The first half of the course provides a hand-on tutorial of ArcGIS Pro, a powerful and industry-leading software for geospatial analysis. Students will benefit from lab assignments and project-based exercises, coupled with readings. The course integrates perspectives from contemporary literature in the physical and social sciences to identify and describe risk, vulnerability, and disaster resilience with empirical data and real-world examples. Students will apply their understanding of course concepts and methods in a semester- long, iterative final project in which they develop a GIS data and analysis to support practical, evidence-based decision-making for emergency and disaster management.