USGIF Launches Initiative to Grow GEOINT Workforce in St. Louis

Herndon, Virginia (April 12, 2017)—The United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF) launched the “St. Louis Initiative” to expand the geospatial intelligence workforce pipeline in the city of St. Louis. As the city experiences an innovation boom and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) prepares to build its new Western campus in north St. Louis, it’s more important than ever to to discuss the future of the city’s GEOINT profession.

While USGIF leadership has been meeting with NGA, Global Skills Exchange, industry, and others for months, the initiative formally kicked off March 28 at a visioneering session held in St. Louis in partnership with USGIF Organizational Member OGSystems.

Hosted at the T-REX coworking space and technology incubator in downtown St. Louis, the visioneering session was dedicated to capturing a discussion about the future GEOINT workforce in the city via graphic recording and visual thinking. More than 30 stakeholders from the St. Louis region attended, including representatives from NGA, Boundless, the City of St. Louis, Washington University, and many others from academia, government, and industry. Attendees provided thoughts on the current workforce and articulated needs for the future. The discussion will be used to help USGIF determine next steps for the initiative.

“USGIF is uniquely positioned to assist the greater St. Louis community to accelerate the conversation in identifying opportunities in the areas of training, education, and lifelong learning to support GEOINT workforce development,” said USGIF Chief Operating Officer Aimee McGranahan. “The visioneering session was a great success. The Foundation is gaining a better understanding from key stakeholders within St. Louis for current and future needs, and identifying ways to move forward with the initiative.”

Through the St. Louis Initiative, USGIF also intends to bolster professional development opportunities for the current GEOINT workforce in St. Louis. Additionally, the Foundation would like to introduce GEOINT and the industry’s myriad career opportunities to K-12 classrooms and expand GEOINT curricula at colleges and universities in the region.