Romain Lacroix

What is your academic background?

I graduated in history and geography (French “licence”) in France. I realized my master in 2 years, without additional training. Among the possible options courses, I chose courses on the modeling of transport systems, transport econometrics, data visualization, courses on the morphological city, courses on cities in economic networks, as well as courses in international political economy .

What has been your career path so far, and what are your plans for the future? Why did you choose this path?

Long-term data digger for various research projects and companies, I am currently a geomatician on permanent contract at the service of the Syndicat des Vignerons des Côtes du Rhône in Avignon (France). This position, beyond the idyllic setting in which it is located, combines the latest technological and technical capabilities in the field of geographic information as well as a strong link to land and territorial resources (AOC viticultural). My work allows me to combine both technical sensitivity and sensitivity to territories.

What challenges did you face during your master’s degree at Unil, and what are are its qualities and flaws in your opinion?

The main challenges of the master are the relatively rapid mastery of a large number of new techniques and computer languages ??that at first glance can be confusing when one comes from a more literary geographical training.
The masters allows to open a very large number of doors and to be able to work on the most varied fields. It arouses curiosity and its great specificity pushes us to be very aware of the latest technical advances in the field.

Among the shortcomings of the master, I can list from my recruitment and current experiences:

  • The label of the specialization that does not necessarily speak to the uninitiated (a large number of positions are to be filled in structures where the geographer/geomatician is often the only one in his field in these structures).
  • The lack of in-depth training in the management of geographical databases (in particular Postgres/Postgis).
  • Lack of assignments that take the form of projects: a typical exercise could be the delivery of a GIS to a client.
  • The limited teaching of Geoserver, and to a lesser extent, that of FME software.

In what way does your master training at the Unil, and more specifically the “spatial analysis” orientation, have been useful during your experience in the professional world?

  • The very good training in geographical data sciences allows a control of their entire life cycle: source searches, controls, database storage, processing, analysis, visualizations and communications.
  • The wide range of techniques and analyzes makes it possible to forge a sharp critical mind and to be very cautious about the various biases of certain geographical and/or statistical analyzes.
  • Learning many computer languages ??makes it possible to be autonomous in achieving very innovative projects, in solving technical problems and gives the abilities to make bridges between the worlds of computer scientists, and the one of geographers and urban planners.