Samford University geography students and faculty made a strong showing for their program at the annual meeting of the Southeastern Division of the Association of American Geographers (SEDAAG,) hosted by the University of North Alabama in November.

Professor Jennifer Rahn is vice president of SEDAAG, professor Jonathan Fleming serves on the group’s Honors Committee, and professor Jordan Cissell is the state of Alabama’s representative for the group.

Geography and Sociology Department chair Jennifer Speights-Binet chaired a session on “Memory and Death” at the meeting, and geographic information systems (GIS) student Caleb Dale earned first place in the meeting’s undergraduate research poster category. Dale’s project–"The effects of precipitation and land usage on E. coli levels of the Coosa River Basin using Remote Sensing” –was supervised by Fleming and Biological and Environmental Sciences Department chair Anthony Overton, underscoring the interdisciplinary applications of GIS and geography in general.

Speights-Binet emphasized the 100% participation of the geography faculty and the high-profile honor for Dale. “For such a small department,” she said, “it is remarkable how much we serve this organization and the discipline of geography more broadly.”