Geography Undergraduate Program Essentials: Recruitment

Ethnic Diversity in Geography Undergraduate Programs

“…The department Web site must radiate feelings of welcoming and warmth and a sense of "I would like to be a part of this Geography Family" to all students. These surrogate electronic experiences should also become opportunities for departments to proclaim to prospective students an uncompromising dedication to diversity people and ideas-a fidelity shown in images, maps, and words (Estaville, Brown, and Caldwell 2006a).…”

“…Students listen thoughtfully to teachers who they genuinely respect and who, in turn, value them and their heritages. Students change their academic majors to geography or transfer from community colleges into geography departments that have outstanding teachers who sincerely care about students and their cultures (Estaville, Brown, and Caldwell 2006a).…”

“…Departments should carefully analyze data collected from surveying graduating students and alumni to better position themselves to concentrate resources and efforts to attract Hispanic and African-American students. Suggesting effective ways to recruit geography undergraduate students, Estaville, Brown, and Caldwell (2006a) used their recruitment model ( Fig. 1) to detail the general flow and actions among key student sources, major influences, and successful strategies for geography undergraduate recruitment.…”

Geography's Place in Higher Education in the United States

“…Gober et al (1995) focus on the period from 1950 to the early 1990s-leading them to paint a picture of significant growth. Estaville et al (2006), by contrast, focus on the period from 1993 to 2001 when the discipline seemed to be losing ground. Choosing the last 15 years is no less arbitrary but it is a useful temporal frame of reference as it corresponds with a time when the discipline moved out of the shadow of the programme closures of the 1980s.…”

Assessment and Evaluation of GIScience Curriculum using the Geographic Information Science and Technology Body of Knowledge

“…In a recent series of articles addressing student recruitment, retention and placement in geography programmes, Estaville et al (2006aEstaville et al ( , 2006bEstaville et al ( , 2006c find that the most important traits of successful geography programmes (including GIS&T) are quality curricula, practical relevance and geospatial skills, all of which can be evaluated in the assessment process. These traits very closely mirror the stated rationale for publishing the BoK (DiBiase et al, 2006, pp.…”