Innovations in GIS and AI for better data

Kate Hess is a Senior Solution Engineer on Esri's National Government team, based in New York City. She supports non-US national statistics offices, helping them modernize census operations, data analysis and dissemination using GIS and remote sensing. Kate also supports UN agencies, efforts toward the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and major conservation organizations. Before joining Esri, she worked with the NASA DEVELOP program, using satellite data to study climate change impacts, and supported the NASA Global Ecosystem Dynamics Investigation (GEDI) mission as a master's student at the University of Maryland. Her specialties include applications of GeoAI and extracting information from imagery, the integration of statistical and geospatial data, field data collection and operations, and GIS data dissemination/ analysis applications.

Michael Gould is global education manager at Esri Inc. where he works on capacity development projects in collaboration with Esri's 85 global offices. He has been lecturer/professor of information systems (GIS) at University Jaume I in Spain since 1997. There he was cofounder of the Master of Science in Geospatial Technologies degree program, funded by the European Commission's Erasmus-plus. He was member and chair of the management council of the Association of Geographic Information Laboratories in Europe (AGILE), participated in the European Spatial Data Infrastructure (INSPIRE), and co-organized 2 dozen Vespucci Summer Institutes in Italy, on a variety of topics in Geographic Information Science. When not working he can often be found on a mountain bike. 

Environmental Engineer with more than 4 years of experience in the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and student of the Specialization in Spatial Analysis at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia. Eager about integrating GIS technology to face challenges and develop innovative solutions.
She is currently part of the Esri Colombia Data team, where she collaborated with different sectors in the implementation of good practices for the structuring and improvement of data quality, contributing to projects and more efficient decision making.

A professional passionate about geographic innovation, with a solid background as a geographer and GIS specialist. In his role as Solutions Engineer at Esri Colombia, he has spent the last 3 years accompanying territorial entities in the adoption of ArcGIS technologies, enhancing their ability to make decisions based on geographic data and face the challenges of sustainable development.