Recordings will be made available for those unable to attend the live sessions!
Have you wondered how to disseminate geographic data online? This full week, in-person Skills School will teach you how to create and prepare GIS data for an online map, embed that map in a website and develop it into an ArcGIS Story Map.
We will be looking at Amelia Edwards' 1873 journey to Egypt, immortalised in her memoir A Thousand Miles Up the Nile, which ultimately led to the creation of the Egypt Exploration Society. Working collaboratively in pairs and as a group to research and create GIS-content, we will cover locations across England, Europe and of course, Egypt itself. You will learn how to design GIS data and projects with suitable attributes and properties for your project, translate data from physical books and online archival sources into GIS data, edit, enhance and merge GIS data, export an online web-map using the QGIS2 Web plugin, host and embed your map as both an online map and an ArcGIS Story Map. You will have learned about the possibilities of ArcGIS Story Maps and engaged in editing your section of the Amelia Edwards story map, which will be published on the Egypt Exploration Society website with full credit to all the contributors.
At the end of the week, you will have an online web-map demonstrating your capabilities in GIS and web-data creation. This map can be embedded in your personal website or linked on your university or institution webpage. You will have contributed to a new ArcGIS Story Map following Amelia Edwards 1873 and be credited as one of the authors when the Story Map is published on the EES website. These tangible and easily accessible products offer a useful means of demonstrating your GIS skills to future institutions, funders or employers in a format they can both see and interact with online. You’ll also learn essential skills for the online dissemination of GIS data, an increasingly important aspect of public archaeology and Egyptology.
Gharbiya pilot project data in ArcGIS Online
This course is for those who have had some interaction with GIS in the past, perhaps through the EES Introduction to GIS for Egyptologists, an EES Skills School or similar. It assumes you have had some experience of using a GIS and some understanding of its basic principles, but does not assume much experience or programming skills.
Tutor
Dr Hannah Pethen
Prerequisites
You will also need a modern laptop computer running a Windows 10, Mac OS High Sierra 10.13, or Linux operating system, with a minimum CPU speed of at least 2.2GHz, at least 8GB of RAM and at least 250GB hard drive/SSD. QGIS does not currently operate on Chromebooks or tablets. Please note that these are the minimum specifications and if you have access to a choice of machines a higher specification computer will perform better.
Before the course, participants will need to have installed or updated QGIS. A guidance document for this will be provided at least one week prior to the course. Participants should also have read A Thousand Miles Up the Nile and may benefit from having their own copy. An 50% discount is exclusively available to participants on this course who wish to purchase a copy.
Venue
The Egypt Exploration Society
3 Doughty Mews
London
WC1N 2PG
Course Outline
Please note that main content will be delivered between 09:30-16:30, though some optional participation (quizzes, socials, etc.) may continue beyond that time.
Monday 9 February 2026, 09:30-16:30 (UK time)
Day One - Recap of Quantum GIS, shapefile creation and editing
On the first day we will recap essential aspects of QGIS as they relate to this project, including coordinate systems for smaller scale projects, creating and editing shapefiles. We will also review Amelia’s journey and produce a simple QGIS map of the stops on Amelia’s journey.
Tuesday 10 February 2026, 09:30-16:30 (UK time)
Day Two - Research, content design and revising the QGIS map
Each pair will review their section of Amelia’s journey in detail and revise their QGIS map, adding additional attributes to their shapefiles and populating those attributes with the content that will drive the narrative and be visible in the web-map popups.
Wednesday 11 February 2026, 09:30-16:30 (UK time)
Day Three - Merging and joining QGIS data
The group will merge and join every pair’s shapefile data to produce a single dataset for Amelia’s route, incorporating the additional attributes developed the previous day. In the afternoon we will undertake a visit to a local heritage site of relevance to the project.
Thursday 12 February 2026, 09:30-16:30 (UK time)
Day Four - Going Online
Today we will prepare the revised QGIS maps, export them using QGIS2Web and learn how to host our online map on Github. Later we will introduce Story Maps and discuss best practices for online dissemination.
Friday 13 February 2026, 09:30-16:30 (UK time)
Day Five - Story Maps
Using the complete merged shapefile and the content developed on day 2, the group will collectively create an ArcGIS Story Map of Amelia’s route, each pair will write content and locating and include relevant images for their section of the route.
Booking and information
Register for your place in advance using the link below. Upon booking, please provide any dietary or access requirements we may need to consider. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about your booking. If you do not receive your email, then please check your junk folders before contacting the Egypt Exploration Society.
The Skills School will be taught entirely in person at the EES London Office. It will be complemented by Google Drive, where resources will be uploaded.
Please ensure that you have read our guide to attending EES events before the event begins. Event tickets are only refundable if notice is provided at least 10 days prior to the event date.
The venue has a limited attendance capacity, so please only sign up if you’re confident that you can attend. If this event does become sold out, please click the book now button to join the waiting list. We will email you if a place becomes available for this event, so you may reconfirm your interest in attending this Muse and Make event.
Please ensure that you have read our guide to attending EES events before the course begins.
