DAVE BERNSTEIN, CH, PLS GISP
Vice President of Hydrospatial Operations, NV5 Geospatial
MICAH BRACHMAN, Ph.D.
Community Manager, Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC)
Micah Brachman, Ph.D., has blended his lifelong passion for maps with a distinguished career in geospatial data science, leveraging his expertise across academic, government, non-profit, and corporate sectors. As a geographer, Micah has developed a skill set encompassing GIS, remote sensing, statistical modeling, and machine learning. Currently, Micah is a Community Manager at the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC), where he serves as the Director of Interoperability Certification, Architect of the Climate and Disaster Resilience Pilot, and supports nearly 100 technical working groups. His role involves enhancing collaboration among over 500 organizations to improve the interoperability of geospatial technologies. Previously, Micah was a Data Scientist at AppFolio, Inc., where he developed and deployed predictive models in R and Python, enhancing business insights and advanced analytics. He also served as a Lecturer at the University of Maryland, designing courses focused on Geospatial Intelligence and training the next generation of geospatial professionals. Micah earned his PhD in Geography from UC Santa Barbara, specializing in transportation, emergency management, and spatial optimization. His extensive experience in the geospatial sciences positions him at the forefront of advancing the global interoperability of geospatial data and technology.
CORA CHONG
GIS Specialist, CBRE
Cora Chong is a GIS Specialist on the Innovation team within the Location Intelligence group at CBRE, a global real estate services company. Her work focuses on spatial consulting for high-value, high-profile commercial real estate projects, which may include adaptive reuse, mixed use, entertainment, and placemaking components.
She graduated from the University of Southern California Spatial Sciences Institute with a M.S. in Geographic Information Science and Technology and is also a GIS instructor at Cuesta College.
CHRISTINE DEVINE
Director of Education and Professional Development at the United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF)
Christine Devine is the Director of Education and Professional Development at the United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF). USGIF is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit educational foundation dedicated to promoting the geospatial intelligence tradecraft and development a stronger GEOINT community with government, industry, academia, and others who develop and apply geospatial intelligence to address national security challenges. As the Director of Education and Professional Development, Christine lead USGIF’s academic programs, including the collegiate accreditation program, the annual scholarship program, and K-12 geospatial education efforts. USGIF supports the future of the GEOINT workforce through our academic programs, which highlight and elevate flexible innovative GEOINT career pathways. Each element within USGIF’s academic program was created to support lifelong learning in the skills and competencies associated with USGIF’s GEOINT Essential Body of Knowledge (EBK) framework. Christine is a human geographer by training with a MS in Geography from George Washington University and a BA in Geography from the University of Mary Washington.
COURTNEY FASSETT
Deloitte
Courtney Fassett has been with Deloitte for four years, contributing her expertise to the Government & Public Services (GPS) practice within the Strategy and Analytics portfolio. Throughout her career, she has primarily served clients in the Federal Health and Defense sectors, focusing on developing strategic plans for digital transformation, and leveraging data analytics and visualization to drive impactful insights. Additionally, Courtney has facilitated strategy sessions aimed at ensuring customer success not only for her clients but internally as well. Currently, Courtney holds the position of Southern California’s Growth Leader. In this role, she oversees the internal Marketing, Business Development, Innovation, Culture, Financials, and Talent Experience teams, driving growth and fostering a collaborative and innovative environment for the SoCal Region. Courtney is a proud graduate of the Spatial Sciences Institute and is originally from Irvine, California.
DANIEL GALL
Deputy Chief Strategy Officer for the Veterans Health Administration, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
Daniel Gall, Deputy Chief Strategy Officer for the Veterans Health Administration, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, oversee the enterprise-wide integration of strategy, information, and insights related to strategic planning; policy and healthcare analysis; enrollment forecasting and cost projections; geospatial data and analytics; and Medicare and Medicaid analysis to enable the Veterans Health Administration to provide industry leading healthcare to U.S. veterans. Throughout his career which began with his service in the U.S. Army, Colonel (Retired) Gall has held key leadership positions from the strategic level transforming health systems down to optimizing operations within medical centers, hospitals
He has a B.S. in Chemistry from the University of Southern California, a Master of National Resource Strategy from the National Defense University, an M.S. in Business Administration from Boston University, and a Master of Health Administration from Baylor University.
THOMAS HORAN, Ph.D
Dean of the School of Business, University of Redlands
Thomas Horan, Ph.D., the H. Jess and Donna Senecal Endowed Dean of the School of Business, is leading the University of Redlands into a new era of 21st-century business education. As dean, Horan has created a strategic approach to advancing the school’s mission and has led a new set of initiatives and programs to enhance student-centeredness and success, embrace corporate and pathway partners, and implement new programs in leadership and spatial analytics. He has testified before the U.S. Congress, served as a technology consultant for the U.S. Department of Transportation, was a health informatics appointee to the American Health Information Community by the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, and was twice recognized by the White House for his health and safety innovations using GIS. Several of his innovations as a private sector researcher have affected health care and emergency response practices.
EVELYN KIM, Ph.D.
Senior Research Scientist, HRL Laboratories
Evelyn Kim, Ph.D., is a Senior Research Scientist and a Group Lead at Intelligent Systems Center at HRL Laboratories. She received her PhD degree in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department from Carnegie Mellon University, MS in Computer Science from Yale, and BA in Computer Science from UC Berkeley.
Her research interests include human-machine teaming, human state sensing, and human factors in cybersecurity.
CANSERINA KURNIA
Solution Engineer for Education at Esri
In her role as Solution Engineer for Education at Esri, Canserina Kurnia provides technical advice and assistance in advancing GIS and Remote Sensing technology for teaching, research, and campus administration in higher education institutions. She has over 20 years of experience working in field of Geospatial technology (GIS) with extensive experience in location analytics, spatial thinking, desktop, enterprise and web GIS. She is passionate in communicating the latest advancement in Geospatial and Esri technology.
ISAIAH MACK
Owner, Eclipse Mapping and GIS LLC
Isaiah Mack is the owner of Eclipse Mapping and GIS LLC and specializes in high accuracy Eos Arrow GNSS receivers and GIS Mapping. Isaiah has been in the geospatial industry for 18 years since graduating from the University of Southern California in 2002 with an M.S. in Geography and Geographic Information Science and Technology (with a focus on Coastal Geomorphology and GIS). Isaiah also received a B.S. in Environmental Science and Geology at the University of Oregon in 1999. Since his graduation from USC, Isaiah has worked with the USC Graduate Programs in Geographic Information Science and Technology, in particular with the Spatial Data Acquisitions course on Catalina Island.
JOHN P. WILSON, Ph.D.
Founding Director and Professor, USC Spatial Sciences Institute
John P. Wilson, Ph.D., is Professor of Sociology and Spatial Sciences in the Dana and David Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences at the University of Southern California (USC) where he founded and directs the Spatial Sciences Institute. He also holds adjunct appointments as Professor in the USC School of Architecture, in the USC Viterbi School of Engineering’s Departments of Computer Science and Civil & Environmental Engineering, and the Keck School of Medicine of USC’s Department of Population and Public Health Sciences. He founded the journal Transactions in GIS in 1996 and has served as editor-in-chief since its inception. He has served on the editorial boards of numerous journals and publications, and also served on the board of directors and as president of the University Consortium for Geographic Information Science (UCGIS). He currently leads the UCGIS GIS&T Body of Knowledge 2.0 project and is an active participant in UNIGIS. His research focus is the modeling of environmental systems and makes extensive use of GIS software tools, fieldwork, spatial analysis techniques, and computer models.
CAROLINE WU
Director of Research, placer.ai
Caroline Wu, Director of Research at placer.ai, brings expertise in retail, CRE, entertainment, media, CPG, and tourism, and specializes in synthesizing broad datasets into actionable recommendations for growth. As Director of Research at Placer.ai, she co-authors the weekly Anchor newsletter, represents Placer at conferences, speaks at industry gatherings, and provides consultative services to C-suite clients. She has held positions as the US Director of Consumer Insights at Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, VP of Retail Insights and Intelligence at Omnicom, and Senior Director at Kantar. She also led research at 20th Century Fox and National Geographic. Caroline holds an MA in Sociology from Stanford University and a BA in International Relations from Stanford University. She currently serves on the USCAA Board of Governors.
