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As president-elect of the American Association for Geodetic Surveying (AAGS), I participated in a joint quarterly meeting with the National Geodetic Survey (NGS), the National Society of Professional Surveyors (NSPS) and AAGS on April 25.

I invite you to visit the AAGS website and consider joining our monthly board meetings, which are held on the second Tuesday of each month. All are welcome to attend. If you are interested, email me at geospatialsolutionsdbz@gmail.com to be added to the attendee list.

Now, for some updates from the joint quarterly meeting.

During the meeting, I provided an update on the Certificate for Geodetic Surveying program, which has been under development by AAGS and is expected to be available by the end of the year. The program is designed to meet the needs of surveyors and others that perform spatial analyses and computations using geodetic methods.

Tim Burch, executive director of the National Society of NSPS, wrote the following in an April 23, 2025, xyHt article:

“To the average professional surveyor, the term “geodesy” does not exist in their everyday conversations about the business. While the use of state plane coordinates has expanded greatly with the development of GPS/GNSS receivers and RTK/RTN connectivity, the mathematics and “black magic” of geodesy remains an enigma to most of the profession.

However, the ongoing progression of technology within surveying instruments has expanded the need for understanding how geodesy works. Our practitioners are faced with expanding their knowledge and expertise of geodesy and thus have put a new challenge on them to find teachers and/or mentors to provide training on the datums and techniques.”

This is exactly what AAGS is attempting to do with the Certificate for Geodetic Surveying program. The information below includes the program description and content. AAGS has developed a set of questions that will determine if an individual has demonstrated a minimum competence in understanding and applying geodetic surveying concepts. AAGS is working with NSPS, who will be administrating the program for AAGS. The status and updates of this program are provided at the AAGS Monthly Board meetings. Come join us to hear more about the program and other AAGS activities.

Certification for Geodetic Surveying

Program description and content. Certification for Geodetic Surveying is official recognition that a person has demonstrated to the satisfaction of the Certification for Geodetic Surveying Board that he or she is minimally competent to perform spatial analyses and computations using geodetic methods.  It is not intended to certify scientists performing research in geodesy.  Rather, it is for individuals who use geodetic concepts and techniques to solve practical problems as a part of performing their work.  Typical practitioners include geodetic surveyors, geodetic/geomatics engineers, geospatial software developers, geographic information systems (GIS) professionals, and geospatial data managers.  The focus is more on the use of applied geodetic methods than with a particular field.  A person who has obtained the Certification for Geodetic Surveying is one who has demonstrated minimum competence.  In this context, “minimum competence” is a combination of working knowledge and familiarity with geodetic concepts that shows the ability to understand and solve applied practical geodetic problems as normally encountered in modern geospatial practice.  Importantly, this includes an understanding of one’s limitations in solving such problems. 

The Certification for Geodetic Surveying Board will identify the depth of knowledge required to achieve minimum competence for Geodetic Certification in the following areas:

• Geometric geodesy
  •  Reference frames, reference systems, geometric datums, and realization strategies
  • Characteristics of modern reference systems, including NAD 83, WGS 84, ITRF, and IGS
  • Transformations between datums, both modern and historic
  • Geodetic, projected, and local geodetic horizon coordinate systems
    • Direct and inverse problems for geodesics and map projections
    • Reference ellipsoids, radii of curvature, and types of geodetic and projected distances
    • Reductions, conversions, and relationships between coordinate systems
    • Transformations used to create “localization/calibration” coordinate systems
• Physical geodesy
  • Gravity, “the” geoid, gravimetric and “hybrid” geoid models, physical height systems, deflection of the vertical
  • Vertical geodetic datum definitions and transformations
  • Types of heights and their relationships; conversions between the various types
  • Terrestrial methods for vertical, horizontal, and 3-D positioning
    • Geodetic leveling and height determination; leveling instrumentation and corrections
    • Modern 3-D terrestrial methods and instruments,…