President’s Column

I can’t believe it’s been a year. It seems like yesterday was August and we blinked and now we're in December. Many of you have experienced several joys and also tragedies, yet have continued to persevere as best you can. The world is a different place for many of us in so many ways than it was 365 days ago. The National Council for Geographic Education (NCGE) has also undergone change, but our change is oriented upwards.

We celebrated many NCGE Successes. This year, I challenged everyone to “Think B.I.G.”—to Believe in Geography. Through a webinar program, renewed framework, and increased communications, we are doing just that. We also had the goal of increasing PK to PhD connections as much as possible. This meant supporting geographic instruction in classrooms from the early grades to grad school. We have had offerings for our early grades and given a platform for graduate students to share their research.

On top of our increase in communications, we also strived to make connections with other geographic or social studies-aligned organizations. This gave birth to NCGE Connect. NCGE Connect, with our partners, is an initiative we created to keep everyone connected across geography. We have created a framework for collaboration and communication where individuals, companies, geography alliances, university departments, and others can share ideas and resources. We look to partner with new organizations like Global Exploration for Educators Organization (GEEO) to enhance our teacher travel products. If you, your company, or group would like to be a part of this, please reach out to our staff to “connect.” In the coming year you will see more and more from NCGE Connect.

Our conference was a smashing success. I must admit I'm still full of excitement from our conference. It is my hope that everyone that attended gained new knowledge, made a new connection, and enjoyed being around like-minded individuals. I want to commend our staff and our conference committees for a job well done. Everyone I talked to during the conference had nothing but good things to say. As always, we will strive to make our future conferences even better than our last. Again, I want to thank our partners at the South Carolina geographic alliance for being instrumental in our success. We also welcome any member feedback, for it is for you that we put our conference on.

With all of our successes, there continue to be challenges on the horizon. Many areas of our country lack a strong geographic presence in their curricula while others are looking to remove geography as a requirement altogether. Outside of legislative challenges, we must also advocate for our friends at colleges and universities as well. They continue to be under threat from consolidation and outright removal from college campuses. NCGE must be upfront as a drum major for geography.

NCGE’s future is bright! We will continue to strengthen our NCGE Connect Initiative. There will continue to be a strong conference. One of our main goals will be to stay financially sound. As of this writing, NCGE is on track to turn a small profit. We will also continue improve the value to our members and the greater geographic education community.

It has been an honor to serve you as your President. I want to thank our board members, sponsors, partners and above all, you the members. For it is through the members that I aimed to serve. I also want to thank our staff for tirelessly working to improve our product. I want to end with a quote from Carol Burnett: “I’m so glad we had this time together.”

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Greg Hill

Greg Hill has enjoyed a 29-year career in education. He teaches high school AP Human Geography, World Regional Geography, and African-American Studies in Mesquite, Texas. Mr. Hill began his social studies teaching career as a World History teacher in Dallas Public Schools. He is also currently a graduate student of Geography at Marshall University focusing on Urban Geography. He is the 2016 recipient of the Distinguished Educator Award: K–12 from the National Council for Geographic Education. He is also the 2020 recipient of the International Educator of the Year Award from the World Affairs Council of Dallas-Ft. Worth. At Horn High, Greg sponsors the Global Young Leaders and coaches the Current Events Team. In addition to serving NCGE as its current president, he has also supported the organization as a member of the Board of Directors.