Two second-year GISDE students, Jerome Chia-Rung Yang and Hong Xia, garnered the “Outstanding Student Paper” award at the 2011 New England-Saint Lawrence Valley Geographical Society (NESTVAL) Annual Conference, held at Concordia University in Montreal in mid-October. The paper is titled “Exploring the Association between Low Birth Weight and Exposure to Lead in Massachusetts Using Geographically Weighted Odds Ratio.”

Authors of winning papers and presentations are invited to submit their papers for publication in the NESTVAL journal: The Northeastern Geographer, which is peer-reviewed.

The Geographic Information Science for Development and Environment (GISDE) program is part of the International Development, Community, and Environment (IDCE) Department at Clark University. GISDE prepares professionals for careers in which they apply the world’s most advanced computer mapping technologies and spatial analysis to address crucial issues concerning socioeconomic development and environmental science.