Dr. Richard P. Greene - GIS Specialist

Dr. Richard P. Greene is an Associate Professor in the Department of Geography at Northern Illinois University.

He received his Ph.D. in 1989 from the University of Minnesota and writes on the subject of land conversion processes on the urban-rural fringe.

Utilizing geographic information systems (GIS), global positioning systems (GPS), and remote sensing technologies he is actively engaged in researching land-use change as a result of urban expansion.

Dr Greene has published in a variety of journals including:

• Landscape and Urban Planning
• Forum of the Association of Arid Lands Studies
• The Social Science Journal
• T he Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science Urban Geography, and Economic Geography.

He has spent time with the U.S. Census Bureau working with very large geographic and demographic databases and has helped the American Farmland Trust (AFT) to develop GIS systems for evaluating the loss of prime farmland to urbanization.

He also collaborates on research concerning land-use change on the urban-rural fringe with regional and local governments in the Chicago metropolitan area.

He has taught a number of GIS workshops for the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Chauatauqua short course series on the topic of GIS and the urban environment.

He has also developed K-12 materials for GIS and GPS education with the Rockford, IL School District and through NASA’s Earth Science Enterprise Education Program.

He is a member of:

• The Association of American Geographers
• Arid Lands Studies Association
• The Western Social Science Association (WSSA)

He is currently serving a 3 year term on the WSSA Executive Council.