Mapping Earthquakes in Northern California

Author: Nicolas R. Malloy

The goal of this activity is for students to learn how to create a basic map layout. In this activity, you will create and organize a project folder using a standardized folder structure. You will then download and decompress the data from public sources. Using the data, you will create a map of earthquake magnitude in the State of California, with an emphasis on Northern California.

Learning Outcomes

Students who complete this tutorial should be able to:

• Summarize the steps for creating and organizing a project workspace folder structure
• Illustrate the ability to download data from a public source
• Demonstrate decompressing zipped files into a specific folder
• Perform data preparation in Microsoft Excel
• Convert tabular XY Data to GIS data using ArcGIS software
• Practice changing map output size in ArcMap
• Apply symbology and color choices to map features
• Insert essential map elements using ArcMap
• Create an inset map
• Export a map as a PDF file