Miss Maria Penn CGeog (GIS)
Employer Name
University of St Mark & St John
Biography
Maria is a Chartered Geographer (GIS) and Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG). She has over 25 years' experience applying geographical information, analytical thinking and business analysis across environmental research, the public sector and higher education. Her career began in environmental science and GIS, working on projects involving soil hydrology, agroforestry, environmental modelling and spatial data analysis. She has since developed extensive expertise in business analysis, enterprise systems and digital transformation, using geographical principles and data-driven approaches to improve organisational processes and decision-making. Maria currently leads business analysis and digital transformation initiatives at Plymouth Marjon University, where she is responsible for the implementation and integration of enterprise technologies supporting student recruitment, admissions and wider institutional services. She remains committed to promoting the value of geography and GIS beyond traditional mapping applications and continues to champion the use of spatial thinking, data management and innovation to solve complex organisational challenges.