Justin Madron
This month's Sustainability Champion is Justin Madron, GIS Project Manager & Analyst in the Digital Scholarship Lab and Instructor for SPCS. Read about how Justin's work with Geographic Information Systems contributes to new perspectives on history that support action for more just and equitable communities in our full interview below.
What is GIS?
GIS stands for Geographic Information Systems and is a very broad term. Most people hear it and think of maps, but it's more about using a system to ask spatial questions of data. Lots of data is rooted in time and space, so GIS allows you to explore those dimensions of data in subjects like landscape analysis, disaster relief, history, and more.
What sparked your interest in the environment and GIS?
I grew up in West Virginia, right near Snowshoe Mountain Resort. That area is a quiet zone with no cell phone service because it's near the National Radio Astronomy Observatory and the county has the largest concentration of public lands in West Virginia with 62% either state or national forest, so if you didn't like the outdoors, there wasn't much else to do. Growing up, I was outside all the time hiking, fishing, and hunting. I also knew a lot of people in the Forest Service and Department of Natural Resources, so I became really interested in forest management and caring for natural resources. It wasn't until later that I realized how fortunate I was to grow up surrounded by natural beauty with that much access to public land. Comparatively, the green space here in Richmond is very limited.
When I went to college, I wanted to study something involving the outdoors. Because I was also interested in design and the creative process, I decided that landscape architecture was a good fit. I loved my undergrad education, and I ended up focusing on GIS and the environmental side of landscape architecture. Later, I attended VCU to get my master's in environmental studies. That program was very technically focused, so I worked with GIS and remote rensing software a lot. My master’s thesis involved looking at how red spruce regenerated after a logging boom in West Virginia in the early 1900’s. It was exciting to be able to use data and GIS to make decisions from hundreds of miles away.
What does your job involve on a day-to-day basis?
It changes a lot based on what projects we're working on. We end up with projects very organically based on ideas we've identified as high priorities or what classes are interested in. In 2013, the Digital Scholarship Lab got a grant from the Mellon Foundation to create a digital atlas of American history and we worked with Stamen Design to make four prototype maps. One of our most popular maps to date is "Mapping Inequality". Most of our projects incorporate social justice components and other projects come about because they're timely, like a map we'll make of presidential elections this upcoming year. We're going to map data from every presidential election since the 1700's. Every day at work involves me working with some piece of data. I also helped develop and teach in the GIS Certificate Program in SPCS, and I teach an intro to GIS course for the Department of Geography when needed.
How do sustainability, history, and justice overlap in GIS?
There's a lot of intersection. GIS is used to make all sorts of better, more efficient decisions whether in relation to environmental impact, human health, or saving money. GIS touches every pillar of sustainability. The projects we're working on in the Digital Scholarship Lab are intended to educate people and help our communities and hopefully leaders make better, more equitable decisions for a more just society going forward. Often, people only see history as something that happened in the past. Through GIS, we can change the narrative and show how history is still having broad impacts today. A good example of this is Renewing Inequality, something that is very much correlated to Mapping Inequality. It shows how federal urban renewal programs were linked to redlining. This resulted in things like strip malls and coliseums replacing African American neighborhoods that had previously been redlined and denied capital. Overall, it demonstrates a continual cycle of inequality. We strive to make our projects function like visual representations of a whole chapter in a history book.
What's one project that you're particularly excited about?
I worked on a book chapter with Todd Lookingbill that recently got published titled “Rethinking Natural Resources in our National Battlefields”. We explored how these areas tend to be perceived from a purely cultural perspective, however they have a lot of natural resource value. Similar to that research, we plan on making a map of national parks in America that showing who had access historically, who has access today, and how and when people have used the parks over time.
How does sustainability impact your life outside the workplace?
Sustainability influenced my whole upbringing and it changed the way I decide what to consume and how to spend my time and money. It's shaped how I think about priorities and relationships. The reminder that I'm not the only human/creature on this earth makes me want to be a good steward in every situation.
How can GIS benefit students?
I love when students who don't fit the profile of GIS users take a course because they bring totally new perspectives. People studying anything related to public health, for example, are used to seeing statistics. But they get really excited when they get to see that information in a visual context, it can be really powerful and can lead to some really innovative ideas. GIS is a great tool for communicating data to the public in a consumable and approachable way.
Thank you, Justin for all you do to support sustainability on campus. Do you know someone who should be featured as a Sustainability Champion? Let us know at sustainability@richmond.edu.