Daniel earned his B.A. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2003), M.S. from the University of Wisconsin at Madison (2006), and Ph.D. from the University of Southern California (2011). Before coming to Wright State, Daniel was an Assistant Professor (Teaching) and Director of Graduate Studies in the Spatial Sciences Institute at the University of Southern California. At USC, Daniel taught courses in spatial sciences and managed the suite of graduate programs in Geographic Information Science and Technology.