theDrive

I lack ArcDesktop on my laptop.  At development time months ago, I was in need of the web ADF for the DOTNET environment on my laptop so I went ahead and uninstalled the build of the Desktop environment that I was running so that I could get Server running and get access to that API.  So now, three weeks after graduation I want to go back and work on updating a custom tool I built back in April, but to do that I need to drive back to Akron (I “relocated” back to Columbus over the holiday weekend).  I’ll spare you the techno babble for now except to say that I am passing on rebuilding the tool in flex and I’m not really interested in developing a user interface blind, so I’m not building in Python or Eclipse, which brings us back to the DOTNET environment; cycles after all.

So the drive back here this morning did give me the opportunity to process the fact that Columbus isn’t home anymore.  The landscape is still similar enough to when I left that I recognize it, but it just feels a bit foreign now.  And so I’m in Akron, a city I was very recently all too eager to get out of, trying to figure out how I can eek out and find an interesting gig in this Shrinking waning region of the country.

And THERE it is folks, the official declaration, I will relocate for/to the highest bidder, and I have locations that are higher than others on my “big board” but Akron/Cleveland are higher on the list than my hometown of Columbus (neither are number 1)

Ethics and Professionalism

So today I am working on the GIS Certification Institute application to become a Geographic Information Systems Professional.  Being completely honest here, the application is a complete pain in the … as it were.  Having gone through a number of other certification programs, this is by far the worst I’ve ever worked on.  Hopefully from here on out it will go smoothly, but griping about that isn’t the point of this post.  The point here falls more to the academic side where I’m still sitting.

So the story…  I’ve been sitting in the lab all morning plugging away at the application, and there are a number of students in the main instructional lab presumably working on homework for summer session classes or their theses.  Still it seems that every time I walk into the lab to get to the printer, or to speak with faculty about any number of topics that I’m working on back here, I get inundated with the “how do you do..” questions, which is all well and good when an undergraduate student who has never had a GIS class asks or when the task is marginally complex, but some of the things that I’m getting asked are fairly self explanatory if you spend a minute to figure out what you’re doing.

And here’s where the ethics comes into play here; finally you’re saying.  If I point click the students through the task they won’t learn anything, if I point click them through it they aren’t even doing their work.  So lets call this my official declaration that I’m not going to help students anymore here in Akron — I’ll help point you to where the information that will help you answer the question is, but I’m not going to answer it; cowboy up and solve the problem yourself.  That’s why you’re here on your “summer break” anyway.  I say this as an ethics thing because I’m considering it part of my professional contribution to the “faith”.  Time for y’all to “get some” for yourselves.  Good luck and happy hunting.