The Geography Department at the University of New Mexico (UNM) is going through a renaissance. New faculty, new courses, a revitalized curriculum in our areas of emphasis make this an exciting time to be at UNM. Four of our six faculty members are new within the past two years creating a level of enthusiasm and excitement that is contagious. Curriculum revisions in the BA, BS, and MS degrees reflect a two year planning process undergone by the Department. This planning process will be completed when the changes take effect in the fall of 2009. Environmental management and Geographic Information Science are the new areas of emphasis. These concentrations bring the Department into the center of the discipline at the intersection between human geography, physical geography, and geographic information science.
Geography as a discipline is also going through a renaissance. Data from the National Center for Educational Statistics shows that undergraduate degrees in geography at U.S. institutions of higher education grew by 58% between 1987 and 2004. During that same time period, masters degrees in geography grew by 39 % and doctoral degrees grew by 53%. A number of reasons explain geography's renaissance. The public is increasingly aware of geography's relevance in an age of globalization, international instability, and accelerating environmental change. Additionally, geographic information science (GI Science) has exploded making fundamental changes in the analytic capability of the discipline. The demand for trained geographers exceeds the supply.
The phenomenal expansion of innovative GI Science and the need to use this within the environmental management context explain the choice of concentrations. Increasingly common are GI Science applications that are part of every day life such as the use of geo-enabled Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) car navigation systems and GPS units in cell phones. In addition, these technologies are proving central to a range of crucial arenas important to environmental management. Expansion in this area in terms of research and practical applications has been remarkable.
By positioning itself at the center of the discipline, the Geography Department, and the University of New Mexico, will become a contributor to the renaissance. Our focus is at the core of the changes occurring within the discipline.