Geography often surprises people when they find out how diverse this discipline is. Geographers work in many different areas, such as environmental management, education, disaster response, city and county planning, community development, among many more professions! In the GP/RM Division alone, we have over 2,000 undergraduate majors at the 17 universities that grant a BA/BS degree. Not only is this an exciting area of study for students, but the research conducted throughout the region is also diverse and exciting, with projects that range from locally-oriented, community-based efforts to international work around the world. We encourage you to explore the activities in the departments through the links provided in the "Regional Departments" section of this website.
Geography is a profoundly interdisciplinary field that is the science of place and space in its essense. Geographers ask where things are located on the surface of the earth, why they are located where they are, how places differ from one another, and how people interact with the environment. Geography is unique in linking the social sciences and natural sciences together.
Today, people are often familiar with geographic technologies due to the ubiquity of mapping applications that now exist on smart phones, navigation systems, and the Internet generally. These applications include Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Remote Sensing, Global Positioning Systems (GPS), online mapping such as Google Earth, and many others, which serve to improve our understanding of a complex world.