Vanessa Knoppke-wetzel
Solution Engineer For Nonprofits And Global Organizations
Washington, District of Columbia, United States
Summary
🤩
Rockstar🎓
Top SchoolVanessa Knoppke-Wetzel is a solution engineer and seasoned cartographer with 11+ years designing and delivering geospatial products and operational GIS systems for nonprofits, global organizations, and humanitarian response. She blends deep cartographic research, product design, and accessibility-focused user research to translate complex spatial data into strategic, mission-driven tools and visual stories. Vanessa has led nonprofit mapping initiatives, taught cartography at the university level, and built mapping programs inside conservation and federal agencies, bringing both hands-on production and organizational leadership. Known in the cartography community for her focus on aesthetics over time, equity, and the intersection of cognition and design, she also drives DEI and community-building through long volunteer service and committee leadership. Practically minded and curious, she pairs technical fluency in mapping tools with project and operational strategy to help organizations scale their GIS impact. Outside work she founded #creativeCarto, co-hosted a cartography podcast, and has been invited to keynote and lecture internationally, underscoring her role as a public-facing advocate for ethical, inclusive mapping.
11 years of coding experience
4 years of employment as a software developer
Master's of Science degree, Cartography & GIS, Master's of Science degree, Cartography & GIS at University of Wisconsin-Madison
Spanish, German
Github Skills (27)
svg10
vector-tiles8
geo7
cartography6
atlas6
visual-editor6
react5
gis5
geospatial5
css5
maps4
python3
raster3
packager3
javascript3
Programming languages (5)
Github contributions (5)
vknoppkewetzel/vknoppkewetzel.github.io
Jan 2015 - Sep 2025
Contributions:155 pushes in 10 years 10 months
vknoppkewetzel/OFDA-50-Anniversary
Jul 2016 - Apr 2017
Contributions:66 pushes, 1 comment in 8 months
lightingmapweb-mappast
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