Geography Awareness Week, November 16th-22nd 2014, features activities and events all over the world related to geography and mapping.  Geography Awareness Week was originally established by National Geographic to promote to Geography in American education and to excite people about geography as both a discipline and a part of everyday life.

In Philadelphia, alone, there are numerous events relating to Geography and mapping during this special week.  Below is a round up!

Monday November 17th

Happy Hour Lecture with Carol Collier of the Academy of Natural Science

Tapping Our Watershed, formerly known as the Delaware River Watershed Initiative Seminar Series, will meet next on Monday, Nov. 17, to raise glasses with Carol Collier, the Academy’s senior adviser  for watershed management and policy.

Tuesday November 18th

Esri GeoDev Meetup: Northeast

This event is a social gathering for developers to discuss the latest in mapping, geo technology, geo services, web and mobile mapping apps, app design, cloud solutions, map data or anything else related to solving real-world “geo” problems.  Developers of all levels of expertise are welcome, from seasoned GIS professionals to those new to geospatial development.

Map Measure Manage: How city government uses place-based data for decision making & civic engagement

A showcase of apps developed by or for Philadelphia City government for data-driven decision-support using spatial technology (GIS). See how your city government uses data to make decisions and reach out to citizens.  Find out what data and tools are available to for civic projects.  Drop-in for a Q&A with City staff and see how these tools are helping to improve city services.

Wednesday November 19th

Penn GIS Day

Penn GIS Day, held in conjunction with the National GIS Day celebration, focuses on real-world applications and innovations stemming from uses of Geographic Information Systems. The forum examines the use of GIS both at Penn and more broadly, offering an opportunity for professional and academic interaction.

Thursday November 20th

2014 Geo Open Source Conference Hosted by LocationTech and Geophilly

Philadelphia’s LocationTech event will be a conference-style speaker series featuring technical talks on the convergence of open source and geospatial. A happy hour follows the conference.

Friday November 21st

LocationTech Code Sprint

This event is a code sprint hosted by Azavea. This event provides an opportunity to work on open source geospatial project code with experts. All projects are welcome.

 Sunday November 23rd

250 Miles Crossing Philadelphia – down the rabbithole

A hand, reaching for a gift wrapped in wrinkly tissue paper with an image of the street that lies on the opposite side of the location where this image can be seen – the facade of the Apple Storage Building on 52nd and Willows Avenue. For us this image is the rabbit-hole that leads us into the virtual world in which our project 250 Miles Crossing Philadelphia* takes place. We took the digital Street-view image from that exact location, printed it and made it into this new world again.

Take the opportunity during Geography Awareness Week to attend these events and explore how geography awareness enhances your daily life.