CGA History

In 1982 Kit Salter at UCLA founded the California Geographical Alliance, a grassroots-style network that brought geography teachers from primary through university levels together with state administrators to discuss making geography part of the education reform going on in California. Since then, the CGA has continually worked to advocate for and support high quality geography education by providing teacher professional development, developing classroom materials and other resources, sponsoring field trips, and enabling teachers to share information about effective strategies. UCLA and Chico State are among the universities that have hosted the CGA. Most recently, Stephen Cunha served as Alliance Coordinator and Humboldt State University as host institution. That arrangement ended in 2011, at which point Alliance Liaisons Roni Jones and Emily Schell stepped forward to maintain CGA operations and momentum through the transition. In October 2013, San Diego State University became the new host institution for the CGA, with Kate Swanson serving as Alliance Coordinator and Tom Herman as Operations Manager.