Daniel Civco, PhD, a professor in the Department of Natural Resources Management and Engineering at the University of Connecticut, has been named the winner.
Daniel Civco, PhD, a
professor in the Department of Natural Resources Management and Engineering at
the University of Connecticut, has been named as the recipient of the 2010
SAIC/Estes Memorial Teaching Award.
The SAIC Estes Memorial Teaching Award was inaugurated in
2003 and is named in honor of Professor John E. (“Jack”) Estes, teacher,
mentor, scientist, and friend of the American Society for Photogrammetry and
Remote Sensing (ASPRS). This award is designed to recognize individual
achievement in the promotion of remote sensing and GIS technology, and
applications through educational efforts.
Award recipients are chosen based on documented excellence in education,
teaching, mentoring and training. The
recipient receives a presentation plaque and a $2,000 cash award
Civco currently serves as Director of the Center for Land use Education
and Research (CLEAR) and is Co-founder of the Laboratory for Earth Resources
Information Systems (LERIS) as well as a Co-PI of the NASA-funded Regional
Earth Resource Applications Center (RESAC) established in 1999. Civco
received his BS degree in Natural Resources Conservation in 1974, and the MS
and PhD degrees in Plant Science, the former concentrating in Landscape
Planning and the latter in Remote Sensing.
Working with
students in the classroom, and spending countless hours preparing content for
his students is Civco’s true passion. His approach toward education is one
based on teaching principles and practices as well as the use of geoprocessing
tools, both of which are essential for the effective management of the
environment. Civco is engaged in
advising undergraduate students within the geomatics and other natural resource
concentrations. He has served as major
advisor to more than 30 MS and PhD-degree graduate students, as well as serving
as Associate Advisor to nearly 70 others. His manuscript “Perspectives on Earth
Resources Mapping Education in the United States” provided the impetus
for the creation of the ASPRS Remote Sensing Core Curriculum, and it served
also as the blueprint for the IAEGS curriculum.
He is a well-published
scholar, and received the ESRI Award for Best Scientific Paper in GIS in 1997
and in 2001, and second place for the 1999 ERDAS Award for the Best Scientific
Paper in
Remote Sensing. In 2007 he received the National Award from the Program for Excellence in College
and University Teaching in the Food and Agricultural Sciences, sponsored by the
U.S. Department of Agriculture, the highest honor an educator in the field of
agriculture and natural resources can receive.
In expressing his
appreciation to ASPRS for this award Civco said, “Receiving an award bearing
Dr. Estes’ name is truly an honor, and to be mentioned in the same company as
past recipients -- words can’t describe what that means to me. Though I got to know him only in the latter
years of his life, I admired and respected Jack throughout my entire
professional career. I am no Jack Estes, but I have tried to aspire to the
principals and ideals that defined him. Jack was an exceptional scholar,
mentor, leader, and gentleman.”
In addition to his
excellence in teaching, Civco has been very active in ASPRS. In his first term as Chair of the ASPRS
Education and Professional Development Committee, he was instrumental in
assisting then President Roger Hoffer in establishing the ASPRS International
Educational Literature Award. He was a Director for the New England Region,
served on the National Board of Directors from 2002 thru 2004, was elected
Director of the Remote Sensing Applications Division in 2000, and served as
Chairman of the ASPRS Education and Professional Development Committee, of
which he will again be Chair in April 2010.
He received an ASPRS Fellow Award in 2003.
The Award, with
funding provided by Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), will
be presented in April at the ASPRS 2010 Annual Conference in San Diego California.
Founded in
1979, The ASPRS Foundation, Inc. is an independent 501(c)3 organization
established to provide grants, scholarships, loans and other forms of aid to
individuals or organizations pursuing knowledge of imaging and geospatial information
science and technology, and their applications across the scientific,
governmental, and commercial sectors.
The Foundation is the primary funding source for all non-sponsored
awards and scholarships recognized by the American Society for Photogrammetry
and Remote Sensing.
ASPRS Announces 2010 SAIC/Estes Memorial Teaching Award Winner
March 5, 2010
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