Land Surveyor Blogs

Happy International Surveyors Week 2012

When I started building Land Surveyors United back in 2007, I never imagined that this project could become so enlightening. Every single day that I wake up on this earth, I am greeted by passionate and driven land surveyors from virtually every location on earth, sharing their experiences and finding solutions to their problems on the network.  Together with RLS Scott Warner of Wisconsin, a set of dedicated calendar days have been determined which will forever serve as a time of annual celebration for geospatial professionals everywhere.  This week of time will forever be called International Surveyors Week and it is happening right this minute.  On Wednesday the 20th of June, we will be observing the world's first ever, Survey Earth in a Day and on the following day (21st) our Land Surveyors University Project will relaunch.  Land Surveyors University will be ongoing for 363 days, ending on June 19th 2013.  This means you will have an entire year to share your experiences and expertise in surveying with your community in the form of 10 levels of experience, so as to educate those with less experience in the industry through teaching by example.  These events and activities have been designed to strengthen the alliance of surveyors in all parts of the world and strengthen the body of professionals in the geospatial industry.

Background of International Surveyors Week

National Surveyors Week, which occurs in the United States on March 18th-24th, is a time when surveyors around the country get together to celebrate being a part of one of the oldest professions known to man.  This is a great time for camaraderie, but only in the USA.  This same type of holiday is desperately needed in many other parts of the world, as surveyors have little, if any, proper representation and no professional society to speak of.  These professionals needed a way to enjoy all of the networking privileges and notoriety as other professionals in more developed areas of the world, so we have created such a way.  On Land Surveyors United, everyone's voice is equally important and equally heard.

You all are surveyors of the world- a world in which everything is interconnected and mutually dependent and interdependent.  If we aspire to attain the accuracy and precision that our profession demands, we must not forget that you can not separate an organism from its background.  I hope that well all take a moment out of this week to learn something new and to reach out to a fellow surveyor who has a question that you know the answer to. I hope that you will take the time to enjoy learning how a fellow surveyor accomplishes a similar job as you are familiar with on the other side of the planet.  This first annual International Surveyors Week is a time for change.  Be a part of it.

International Surveyors Week is a time to celebrate our differences as well as those similarities which make us all understand one another, despite linguistic and cultural differences.  We all experience learning curves and technological breakdowns.  We all have trouble at times with learning something new.  And we all are accountable for the professional decisions that we make. Most other places online built for surveyors are built purely for advertising and pushing the agenda of those who are manufacturing the latest equipment and in those same places you find surveyors bashing other surveyors, simply for asking a question. I have always found it difficult to digest and did something about it.  In fact, I wake up everyday and do a little something to help this situation become better for you, not for myself.  Its anthropology which drives me to constantly imagine and create these avenues for all geospatial professionals around the world.  Take it or leave it, its working!  And with well over 3000 professionals on this network, many have said that LSU may just be the only qualified community to hold such an event as International Surveyors Week.   Why?  Because LSU is the opposite of everything else out there who would love to be like it.  You are the change that is needed in your industry.

Technology Schmechnology

With all of the overwhelming advances in survey technology and uncertain futures for geospatial professionals in many parts of the world, what a surveyor needs most is a personal network of other surveyors to lean on in times of need. What separates us all is simply geography.  You are all the most qualified individuals on earth to understand that.  When you take that away for just a second, you see that we all are responsible for the same types of results in our work and we must all deal with technological advances which may or may not jeopardize our jobs in the future.  Working together, this possibility becomes less of a threat.  As long as we all stick together and share what we know, it will be quite difficult to replace us with robots in the future.

Just look at our Global Member Map Presentation to see all of this at work.

For those of you who have not yet registered to participate in Survey Earth in a Day, you are simply letting your fellow surveyors down.  You can accomplish the task in minutes, right from where you are working. The Point Logging Process is as simple as it can be given our grassroots approach and limited budget.

It has been said that bringing surveyors together across the globe is impossible.  On Wednesday, Survey Earth in a Day will forever change the mind of the naysayer, as we measure the entire surface of the earth in a single day using our network and the true power of social media.

Land Surveyors United... the mission is in the name.