Samford’s Geography Department fielded a large group of majors at the Southeastern Association of American Geographers Conference in Asheville, N.C., on Nov. 18-20. One student brought home top honors in her category.

Nine geography majors presented research projects ranging from mapping historic cemeteries to using Google Earth to understand the conquests of Genghis Kahn, and from 21st century Protestant mapping to patterns of homelessness in Birmingham, Ala.

Meghan McCollum, a senior geography major from Buford, Ga., won the undergraduate poster competition with her work on “Dune Vegetation on Dauphin Island.” The project was funded through the Arts & Sciences Program for Independent Research (ASPIRE) student research grants.

Most of the projects were designed and completed as part of geography professor Jennifer Rahn’s Advanced Geographic Information Systems course. Several projects represented the work of seniors who are completing their “capstone” project for their geography major.

“For a department as small as ours to have nine participants in the undergraduate competition is extraordinary,” said geography professor Jennifer Speights-Binet, who accompanied the group to Asheville. “We had the most participants of any other university in the Southeast region, including very large departments at some prestigious universities."

Participating Samford Students

Bob Barnett, “The Least of These: Exploring Homeless Ministry in Birmingham, Alabama”

Zach Brumfield, “History of the Town of Arwkright, Alabama”

Kyle Duncan, “Ever Changing Streets: The Geographic and Human Migration of the Homeless in Birmingham, Alabama”

Meghan McCollum, “Dune Vegetation on Dauphin Island”

Anna Morrison, “Christian Mapping in the 21st Century"

Shannon Moore, “Puerto Supe: An Environmental History of a Coastal Peruvian Town”

Austin Storms, “Mapping Shelby County’s Historic Bailey Cemetery”

Cameron Yaw, “Bailey Cemetery: History and Spatial Distribution of Grave Sites”