University of Richmond Geography professor, Dr. David Salisbury, rescued a three-toed sloth while in the Amazon Rainforest. While sloths can swim, the current in the Jurua River in Peru was too strong at the time for the sloth to make it safely across.
We’re pleased to recognize our 2024 departmental award winners:
Outstanding Senior Geographer: Matteo Gonzalez
Exemplary Geography Research Award: Shaoting Wen
Exemplary Service Award: Eli Beech-Brown
Outstanding Service to the Spatial Analysis Lab: Caitlin Fay
The Department of Geography, Environment, and Sustainability prepares students to explore and understand cultural, bio‐physical, and geospatial environments, and their interactions and transformations, thereby empowering our students to shape a just and sustainable world. Geography professors offer exciting, experiential courses on a range of important issues like global climate change, industrialization, resource management, agricultural change, urbanization, land use, deforestation, and hydrology. Students will learn to use Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and related geospatial technologies to prepare them for exciting employment and research opportunities in many different fields.
Each year the Department of Geography, Environment, & Sustainability, the Environmental Studies Program, and Global Studies Program partner to bring noteworthy speakers and scholars to Richmond to present lectures related to our global environment. All events are free and open to the public.
Beth Zizzamia, Spatial Analysis Lab GIS operations manager, along with undergraduate Matteo Gonzalez, ‘24, and Kyle Redican, teaching faculty of geography, environment, & sustainability and director of the Spatial Analysis Lab, published “Assessing ChatGPT for GIS education and assignment creation” in the Journal of Geography in Higher Education.
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Kyle Redican, teaching faculty of geography, environment, & sustainability and director of the Spatial Analysis Lab, along with undergraduate Matteo Gonzalez, ‘24, and Beth Zizzamia, Spatial Analysis Lab GIS operations manager, published “Assessing ChatGPT for GIS education and assignment creation” in the Journal of Geography in Higher Education.
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Todd Lookingbill, professor of geography, environment, & sustainability, published “A Heat Emergency: Urban Heat Exposure and Access to Refuge in Richmond, VA” in GeoHealth.
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Todd Lookingbill, professor of geography, environment, & sustainability, along with undergraduates Jack DuPuy, ’25, Ellery Jacobs, ’25, Matteo Gonzalez, ’24, and Tihomir S. Kostadinov, ’02 published "A 20-Year Ecotone Study of Pacific Northwest Mountain Forest Vulnerability to Changing Snow Conditions" in Land.
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Research on fall foliage from geography and environment professor Stephanie Spera is highlighted.
Stephanie Spera, a geography, environment, and sustainability professor, is quoted related to her research on climate change and fall leaves.
Geography, environment, & sustainability professor Todd Lookingbill is interviewed about his research on the ecological value of battlefields.
The University of Richmond's Scholarship Repository shares faculty publications with a world-wide audience. The map below shows where articles from geography faculty are being read around the globe.
Mailing address:
Department of Geography, Environment, & Sustainability
Carole Weinstein International Center, 3rd Floor
211 Richmond Way
University of Richmond, Virginia 23173
Phone: (804) 287-8661
Fax: (804) 484-1577
Spatial Analysis Laboratory: (804) 484-1518
Department Chair: David Salisbury
Major Advisors: Mary Finley-Brook, Todd Lookingbill, Kyle Redican, David Salisbury, and Stephanie Spera
Academic Administrative Specialist: Nancy Propst
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