Does DE need a C? A proposal for a DE curriculum

Abstract

The vision of a digital earth (DE) is continuously evolving, and the next-generation infrastructures, platforms and applications are being implemented. In this article, we attempt to initiate a debate within the DE and with affine communities about ‘why’ a digital earth curriculum (DEC) is needed, ‘how’ it should be developed, and ‘what’ it could look like. It is impossible to do justice to the Herculean effort of DEC development without extensive consultations with the broader community. We propose a frame for the debate (what, why, and how of a DEC) and a rationale for and elements of a curriculum for educating the coming generations of digital natives and indicate possible realizations. We particularly argue that a DEC is not a déjà vu of classical research and training agendas of geographic information science, remote sensing, and similar fields by emphasizing its unique characteristics.

Keywords:

• learning
• education
• teaching
• training
• curriculum

1. What is DE?

Information technology has become a cornerstone of modern life. New generations are born ‘digital’ in a mobile Internet and Web 2.0 environment – just as the decision-makers of today were born into a world of black-and-white TV and wired phones. Young digital natives grow up nowadays under the shadow of political agendas aiming at economic growth on a sustainable planet with resilient ecosystems (Martin and Henrichs 2012). Geospatial data and explicitly spatial viewpoints are essential enablers for these developments, as they connect facts and events to locations and places on earth and enable information integration. Already today, location-based services, mobile navigation systems, virtual globes, and geotagging render geospatial data useful for the general public, i.e. far beyond the usual expert systems, such as geographic information systems (GISs), spatial data infrastructures (SDIs), and remote sensing applications – for citizens, businesspeople, and politicians.

For the last 20 years, the idea of a ‘digital earth’ (DE) has accompanied and helped guide a variety of developments. The notion – first coined in 1992 with futuristic ideas about freely navigable virtual globes as knowledge sharing platforms – is still subject to continuous adaptation to technological and societal developments (Gore 1992). Over the years, important operational features have been studied with respect to the capabilities, limitations, and importance of DE (McGuire and Longley 2005; Goodchild 2008; Craglia et al. 2012; Goodchild et al. 2012). DE is now recognized as a communication science and technology with the demonstrated ability to allow ‘geospatial’ engagement and interaction across the public spectrum (Craglia et al. 2012; Goodchild et al. 2012). The functionality of DE prototypes has made good progress (McGuire and Longley 2005; Goodchild 2008). Last year, the International Society for digital earth (ISDE) arrived at a definition that acknowledges multiple interconnected information systems, based on diverse platforms and designed for multiple audiences (Goodchild et al. 2012). The ISDE has identified and recommended development steps for achieving the DE vision, including – among others – a new governance model and ethical code to tackle intellectual property rights and privacy issues (Ehlers et al. 2013). Dynamic tensions between industry, government, academia and a rapidly growing independent and ‘open’ user community will inevitably influence future pathways.

Regardless of the natural evolution of DE, we see one predominant challenge: raising awareness of, building the competences and skills for, and creating the capability to influence next-generation DE. With this article, we initiate and frame a debate about this challenge. We introduce the components of a knowledge base for such a digital earth curriculum (DEC) and suggest how these component parts, or disciplines, could be organized and delivered to best serve society. Thus, our DEC initiative defines the major compass bearings, guiding a small but growing international community of DE advocates and scholars.

2. Why does DE need a C?

Currently, DE is a confluence and amalgamation of many fields of study. DE is building upon the shoulders of numerous technology giants by applying the products from decades of collective effort within the remote sensing and GIS communities, by the SDI community, the Global Earth Observation community, and other leading international collaborations. Interoperability and communication protocol standards of the worldwide web are directly responsible for DE's success (Percivall 2010).

DE's proclivity for synthesis and visualization-based interaction will only be realized if DE continues to build strong relationships with the international standards development and science organizations and growing coalitions of talented user communities. Already the complexity and specialization of DE's component technologies demand strategic partnerships and collaborations. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan introduced ‘Type Two partnerships’ as a formula for success in addressing the world's challenges toward sustainable development (Hens and Nath 2005). These partnerships, he explained, would entail collaboration between academics, industry, citizens, and government. In addition, as the performance of DE becomes increasingly relevant for social sciences and humanities, we are likely to experience a surge in a proactive community's growth exhibiting seminal and transformational applications.

The maturing DE society should chart educational territory to match the exponential growth of this disruptive technology suite. This is important because the international community will need to reach a significantly higher level of transdisciplinary awareness and collaboration in harnessing DE technology to address society's priority challenges. Traditional curricula, such as Remote Sensing, GIS, and SDI represent important framework components; however, a revolutionary delivery approach and constitution must be considered. This will require considerably more involvement by scientists, politicians, and citizens to capture the potential of DE and to direct it at general education.

When looking at the state-of-the-art capabilities of primary, secondary, and higher education, it is difficult to fully appreciate the actual nascent stage of the requested transdisciplinary awareness. An examination of current collegiate and precollegiate educational systems shows that a DE-inspired pedagogy does not exist within, nor owes allegiance to, any existing field of study. DE components and system applications reach beyond existing university departmental and curriculum frameworks, as well as any schools of thought.

While building on stable foundations, it shall be the disruptive potential of DE in terms of thinking about the interplay between our actions and our environment, which drives a curriculum for the future DE. It remains to be seen which DE-related issues are already covered by existing ‘traditional’ research areas and what makes DE a game changer in terms of political targets (socioeconomic and environmental) and market forces in the coming decades.

3. How should a DEC be developed?

DEC can be viewed as either an addendum to traditional-style curricula or as a new evolutionary branch in human knowledge. We identify three possible modalities for DEC development:

1. Integrative, i.e. DEC includes other curricula from the spatial information sciences (such as remote sensing and GIS, SDI, etc.) and expands upon applications.

2. Evolutionary, i.e. DEC, connects the principal components of current GIS and other curricula and while focusing particularly on their next generation's manifestations and challenges excludes some of the classical topics.

3. Complementary, i.e. acknowledging traditional topics of remote sensing and GIS and the like, while leap-frogging among fields such as spatial enablement, quantified self, smart location and place, and spatiotemporal fusion and modeling analytics.

Like in all curricula and even more their implementation in learning environments, we need to be clear about target audiences. There might be multiple target groups and, therefore, multiple curricular approaches. For us, and in line with our earlier arguments, DEC should be clearly distinguishable from traditional fields of studies. It must attend to an interested young (or young minded) community, i.e. those digital natives growing up in dynamic times with DE applications that use drones, multiple mobile devices, sensor networks, Big Data analysis across social media, and other upcoming technologies. It should be multi- and interdisciplinary in structure to fully encompass the array of disciplines experiencing exponential expansion, located between traditional fields we have today – a sum that is more than its parts.

DEC should express more than a superset of existing study programs. It should elaborate on integrating aspects of multi- and interdisciplinary and principles of interoperability and transcend the confines of a single ‘traditional’ discipline. While building on stable knowledge foundations, DEC needs to focus on the eclectic backgrounds necessary to understand and incorporate the knowledge fundaments with concentration on the creation and use of DE applications. DEC needs to foster the transformative capacity to provide motivated people with the requisite background and awareness. The curriculum must facilitate capabilities to improve our existing conditions and trajectories using the power of spatially enabled location and place-based technologies and applications. Criteria for how the curriculum should be developed for different educational levels include the following key characteristics:

• Full access to best-practices and what constitutes interdisciplinary knowledge;

• Access to a critical mass of web-based technology and open software tools;

• Access to guidance from a network of DE veterans and gifted novices; and

• Connection to key institutions and incubator nodes for alignment, support, and effective mentoring frameworks.

4. How should a DEC design evolve?

It would be a missed opportunity if we would not make DE (new technologies) work for itself. In this sense, we should – to a certain degree – look for a new educational paradigm, or at least adopt what is currently discussed. At this time, especially before in-depth discussions within ISDE, it would be premature to stake a specific claim to the format and content of a DEC. Still, we can consider a set of expectations regarding how the curriculum might appear to the new student. Development should embrace the evolving paradigms of open social networks that can capture the dynamic nature of both technology and social interactions.

Our proposal for a DEC cocreation model process aligned with the previously mentioned Type Two partnership approaches, also put forward by the knowledge and innovation communities (KICs) of the European Institute for innovation and technology, should not lead to a déjà vu in terms of curriculum process. The stakes are too high for us to consider any but the best path forward. We will require technology and society interlinked in an unprecedented combined campaign to address the great challenges facing humanity in the twenty-first century. Together with the involvement of new participants (representatives from governments, differently sized industries and citizen – instead of only classical lecturers), we suggest to also consider Mode 2 knowledge production: a new paradigm for knowledge production that arises due to current trends of ‘steering’ of research priorities, commercialization of research, and accountability of science (Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff 2000).

We should capitalize on international events, organized by the ISDE, to ensure that the core curriculum process and subjects are constructed from the volunteer contributions of the society's membership. This particularly should address the following questions for the shaping and subsequent realization of DEC (starting points included in parenthesis):

• Which characteristics are particular to DEC? (transdisciplinary, addressing disruptive geospatial technologies in the context of grant socioeconomic challenges).

• Should we follow an integrative, evolutionary, or complementary approach, and what are the pros and cons of each alternative? (A complementary approach could focus on disruptive characteristics, but requires much background knowledge from other disciplines).

• Which audiences do we want to address and how should we differentiate the interactions with each? (Public participation has to be strengthened, as well as application developers have to be trained, MOOCs – see below – might only be beneficial for high-level awareness raising.)

• How can we effectively harness the power of the DE metaphor and user-friendly technology to engage with students, citizens, and decision-makers around our planet? (Virtual globes could be extended with collaborative platforms so that DE applications and training materials become integrated).

• Should we follow massive open online courses (MOOCs), which already force leading universities to revisit their missions and business fundamentals? (In their current form, MOOCs especially face motivation challenges, they may become only part of the solution, or the concept as such will have to evolve.)

Importantly, we encourage all readers, who may wish to align with this DEC initiative to communicate with the corresponding author. We envision DEC as a continuous growth educational resource model that can support the demand for high-quality, state-of-the-art lectures throughout the many DE disciplines. A call for expert volunteer contributions will be shared with the many closely affiliated professional associations through publications and professional social networks to organize workshops in the associated disciplines to connect and build upon. We welcome input, comments, and volunteers to assist the ISDE in creating a better educational foundation using a better set of tools to prepare the next generation for managing and preserving our common Earth.

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful for the many fruitful discussions with members of the ISDE and its Youth Commission, especially addressing required education and training. Thanks are due to the two anonymous reviewers for their incisive comments, which helped us significantly improve the quality of this article.