Presenting River Journey at GIS Conference

The River Journey Project will be presented at the ESRI Education GIS Conference this June. Each year, ESRI (the large geographic information system or GIS company), holds a user conference for those working with its products. One part of the conference is focused on the use of GIS in K-12 and higher education and is a chance for teachers and students and others that support GIS education to share project application experiences and new resources.

Title: River Journey: High School Story Maps for Art-led Environmental Education

Abstract: In River Journey, Minnesota high school students explored how their school’s kitchen sink is interconnected with their region by following their tap water along upstream and downstream water infrastructure to its source and destination at the Mississippi River. Over the year, and across the curriculum, they created online story maps about their journey and the river’s value.  This presentation considers how GIS complemented fieldwork, and enhanced narrative-aesthetic understandings of place.

Mississippi River Vessel

Here's one of the works shown as part of the
"We Watch the Stream" exhibit.

>>Update:  
Mississippi River Vessel has been included in the exhibition:
The River: Memory and Metaphor on the Mississippi
Curated by Jeff Rathermel

March 4, 2016 – July 10, 2016
Opening reception: March, 4; 6-9pm

At the Minnesota Center for Book Arts
1011 Washington Ave. S.
Suite 100
Minneapolis MN 55415
612-215-2520
mcba@mnbookarts.org

Mississippi River Vessel, 2015

Jonee Kulman Brigham
 

Glass bottle, wooden crate, heat-transfer letters, hand-dyed cotton, ceremonial water from River’s Edge Academy kitchen sink

20 x 36 x 20 inches

Mississippi River Vessel is a participatory artwork designed to support the River Journey project.  It was used in the closing ceremony for River Journey on June 3, 2015.  As was done at the opening ceremony, Brigham and River’s Edge Academy staff read the River Journey poem during the school’s circle time, where all students and staff gather as a community.  Then students and staff were invited to pour some water from the River’s Edge Academy kitchen sink (sourced from the Mississippi River) into the vessel while answering, “What are you grateful for about the Mississippi River?”