About the Instructor

Dr. Wansoo Im specializes in developing decision support systems using an interactive web-based geographical information systems (GIS) with public participatory approach. He is an assistant professor at Meharry Medical Collage in Tennessee and is an adjunct faculty member at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey in New Brunswick. He received his Masters in Urban and Regional Planning from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and his Ph.D. from the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers. He teaches interactive mapping skills to teachers, high school and college students, and members of community organizations across the country. He consults with non-profit and governmental agencies on creating and using location based databases to address community issues. He has in-depth knowledge about building transportation decision support systems and modeling watershed resources and has been invited as a keynote speaker for various health and GIS conferences. Dr. Im is most proud of his web portal, http://www.imrivers.org, which is currently being used by multiple environmental organizations across the United States. His work on community participatory internet mapping was featured in The New Yorker magazine in 2006 (http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/03/27/060327ta_talk_seabrook ) and The New York Times in 2008.