MORPHOLOGICAL CHANGES ON EASTERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY CAMPUS OVER THE PAST 80 YEARS

Remote sensing is the art and science of detecting, analyzing, and recording reflected and emitted radiation from the surface of the earth without contact. Remote sensing plays a significant role in our world due to its numerous applications. One application on which I focused was the use in aerial imagery to obtain information about human settlements. In my research, I used aerial imagery to monitor and detect changes on EIU campus and its surrounding areas in Charleston, IL. The construction of EIU campus has had a drastic impact on the Charleston environment – reconstructing drainage and changing the landscape through decades.

In effect, with the aerial imagery and remote sensing technology, I was able to compare the morphological changes on EIU campus over the past 80 years, through georegistering, assessing, and classifying images of the land surface. After repeating this process with images from 1930 and 1950, I compared them to images of the campus in 2017. I found an interesting correlation between land use and events that occurred over the years in the school and the USA at large. Some areas of the campus remained the same throughout the years, and others changed due to a reform in the general educational objectives of the USA during the 20th century. This reform led to changes in EIU’s campus both physically and educationally by expanding the school and changing its educational objectives from being a teacher’s college (Eastern Illinois Normal School) to a comprehensive university with a broad curriculum (Eastern Illinois University).

My documented history of these effects from the results of the research would be useful both historically and in future planning for the EIU campus and its surrounding area. Additionally, my results from the research will be used in future lectures in Remote Sensing classes in the EIU Geology/Geography department.