International & Executive Programs (IEP) and the Geospatial Innovation Facility (GIF) celebrated a successful first bootcamp on the emerging field of Spatial Data Science last Saturday. Hosted in partnership between IEP and GIF and sponsored by Esri and Informatics and GIS Program at the University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources, 30 GIS professionals from various sectors came together to learn how to integrate open source and web-based solutions into their GIS toolkit by gaining an understanding of spatial data science techniques.

The hands-on course, taught by UC Berkeley experts in Spatial Data Science, utilized open source tools to find, evaluate, manage, analyze, and publish spatial data in a variety of environments. Participants learned to develop and refine repeatable and testable workflows using the latest spatial data technology, and were able to see examples of how analyses can be completed efficiently with open-source tools such as Pysal. Participants were impressed by the scope and applicability of the course material, stating “I kept wishing other staff from [my] office were here,” and “It is hard to imagine learning this much in even a month of self-learning.”

Due to the overwhelming response to this bootcamp, IEP and GIF look forward to refining the curriculum and hosting a new cohort this winter.