Prerequisite: Bachelor’s Degree in Architecture (B. Sc. Arch.)

Overview

UGOC’s Master’s of Urban Planning or Development provides knowledge, understanding and ability to address the broad concepts and specific skills needed to excel in the public and private sectors.  This program provides students with the knowledge base and analytical and design skills to address issues that affect the quality of life in communities.  Urban and regional planners develop strategies and design communities with planning ideas that help balance community, environmental, and economic needs.  The successful planner understands how communities deal with growth and change, and assists the renewal in ways that will maintain and improve the community’s overall health.

Objective

This program is designed to provide the student with the knowledge, skills and abilities necessary to critically analyze and solve complex problems and successfully present solutions to the communities they will work with as a planning professional.  The student will learn about the competing social, environmental and cultural issues involved when communities change or grow, and will develop the critical skills needed to deal with complex issues and present solutions that insure communities facing these issues grow in a healthy manner.

Abilities

Successful planners typically demonstrate the following:

• Mastery of geographic information systems (GIS) and Office Suite software
• Understanding of urban spatial structure, physical layout, and urban growth
• Skill in planning and project evaluation
• Understanding of local and government programs and processes
• Communication Skills: Learning to clearly articulate plans, during singular or public presentations and insuring good open, information channels
• Development of skills in mediation for problem resolution
• Project and Stakeholder Management: Managing resources (personnel, financial and IT) and directing a multidisciplinary team while also diplomatically interacting with stakeholders through successful negotiation, facilitation, mediation and advocacy
• Good Research Skills: Data collection, often in challenging environments over a relatively short period, requires focus, expert research, organizational skills, and an adaptive mentality
• Time Management: Strong skills in setting priorities and meeting time sensitive goals is vital for the successful Planner.

Opportunity

The urban and regional planning field requires individuals with knowledge in a vast number of subject areas. Mathematics, earth sciences, life sciences, physics, geology, geography and policy are just a few. Majoring in any of these areas will provide some of the knowledge and skills needed for progression towards the Master’s degree in Urban Planning . Regardless of the discipline in which the individual earns their undergraduate degree, a graduate degree is preferred by the majority of those who will require the services of a planner. The advanced education provides the time necessary to acquire more of the knowledge and skills which are essential to success in the field of urban and regional planning.