NMTF is revving up for an exciting term, starting this Wednesday, February 15th at 8pm in IAB 405 with our “kickoff” meeting! The NMTF board will provide a general introduction to the topics of crisis mapping and ICTs for Development as well as information about the many workshops, trainings and brownbag events planned for spring term. Pizza and refreshments will be provided. Students with all levels of experience with technologies and new media are welcome!
Immediately following the meeting (~9 p.m.) will be a brief general training on crisis mapping, in order to prepare students to participate in the upcoming Syria deployment. Those who wish to participate in the training should bring a laptop. If you are already a member of SBTF, there is no need to stay for the training.
This activation is the result of a request by Amnesty International USA for assistance analyzing satellite imagery to identify evidence of human rights violations. The work will be similar to the Somalia deployment, once again utilizing the Tomnod platform. The date of the subsequent training and deployment are currently being determined by SBTF.
Several members of this year’s board participated in their first ever crisis mapping deployment during the fall of 2011. The Somalia Satellite Imagery deployment, a partnership with Standby Task Force and UNHCR was an instrumental exercise in crowdsourcing and the use of the micro-tasking platform Tomnod. The entire mapster community received a thank you from the UNHCR’s Deputy High Commissioner.
If you are interested in the Syria deployment, please email NMTF’s Director of Crisis Mapping, Chris Planicka, at [email protected] and include your experience, noting what deployments you have taken part in.