My name is J. Michael Johnson, but everyone calls me Mike.

I am a PhD candidate in Geography at the University of California, Santa Barbara working with Keith C. Clarke. I was the 2019-2020 Jack Dangermond GIS Fellow in residence at UCSB.

Currently, I am a NOAA Affiliate (Water Resource Engineer II) assigned to support The National Water Center and their next generation water models. Additionally, I'm a primary data scientist working to to develop the NSF supported Urban Flooding Open Knowledge Network.

In the past, I have served as a research fellow and coordinator for the NOAA National Water Center Summer Institute, spent time as a visting researcher at NCAR and the VU Amsterdam. Most recently, I am working closely with members of the USGS on issues related to data access and data modeling including the NHDPlus, the Network Linked Data Index, and the National Water Model.

In the summer of 2020, I independently developed a geoinformatics course teaching the foundations of spatial data science and have TA’d courses in physical geography, climate change, remote sensing, and software development.

Before coming to UCSB, I received my B.S in Geography & Anthropology from Cal Poly along with minors in GIS for Agriculture, Water Science, Statistics, Economics, and Environmental Studies.

If interested you may view my current work, publications, and software if I can answer any questions, feel free to reach out by email