I hope all of you enjoyed your Christmas break and are ready to get back to
the grind.  Several teachers have inquired about what GPS unit will be
allowed at the Environmental Natural Resources CDE this year because of the
fact that the some of the units listed in the rules are no longer
available.  I believe the simplest fix to this challenge is to say that any
12 channel, hand held unit will be allowed.  Let me go on and say that the
GPS event will be set up with a Garmin 12.  This unit is as similar to the
310 and SporTrak as any I could find .  The GPS event will be somewhat
different than in the past.  I will not give all four of the coordinates to
the students at the beginning.  I will only give them their first
coordinate and the number of the placard they are to find.  When they
locate it, the next coordinate will be with the placard along with the next
number they are to locate.  This will continue until they locate all four.
As in the past, the student should record the name listed on the placard at
each station found on their scoresheet.  The event will be timed as stated
in the rules.  The GPS's coordinate system should be setup to read the
longitude and latitude in degrees, minutes and seconds with the map datum
being set to NAD83.  The environmental topic  will be "Soils" this year and
the test questions will come from the soils unit of the  "Applied
Environmental Sciences" cd.  A copy of this cd can be purchased from
National FFA.  The identification list is the same as listed in the awards
bulletin.  Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions
concerning this.


John Allen Bailey
Central Region
Area Forest Resource Teacher
711 Hwy 57 West
Swainsboro, GA  30401
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478-289-2552