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Green Space Accessibility at Ontario Elementary Schools and School Performance
Topics: Geographic Information Science and Systems
, Spatial Analysis & Modeling
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Keywords: Satellite remote sensing, green space, accessibility, student performance, linear regression Session Type: Virtual Paper Day: Friday Session Start / End Time: 4/9/2021 03:05 PM (Pacific Time (US & Canada)) - 4/9/2021 04:20 PM (Pacific Time (US & Canada)) Room: Virtual 14
Authors:
Scarlett Rakowska, University of Toronto Mississauga
Matthew Adams, University of Toronto Mississauga
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Abstract
This study assesses the green space accessibility for students at Ontario elementary schools, including greenspace on the school property and in the neighbourhood. School boundaries were obtained by extracting school addresses from the Ontario Ministry of Education website. Simultaneously, enrollment numbers, school board information, and standardized test marks were extracted. Each address was geocoded and manually validated using satellite imagery. Property boundary data were obtained from the Ontario Electronic Land Registration, which required manual validation and digital editing in a GIS. Remote sensing is used to identify greenspace within school parcel boundaries, calculated using an NDVI threshold on Landsat 8 data. School performance data were based on province-wide standardized tests at the third- and sixth-grade level. Student performance is regressed against greenspace with both spatial and aspatial regression models. Socioeconomic factors are included as confounding factors in the statistical analysis. The statistical correlation between green space and student performance may indicate a potential causal effect to help support a need to incorporate green space into planning, development, and redevelopment of schools in Ontario.
Green Space Accessibility at Ontario Elementary Schools and School Performance