Urban and Regional Planning

Urban and regional planners develop programs and policies to guide future growth and redevelopment of urban, suburban, and rural communities. You assist elected officials in solving the social, economic, and environmental problems of your communities. This major attracts students who are interested in learning how to solve these issues.

Planners are concerned with a variety of national policy issues: revitalizing deteriorating central cities and depressed rural areas, providing new and affordable housing, including citizens in decision-making, combating pollution and conserving scarce resources, designing more efficient public services, and solving long-standing social problems such as discrimination and inequality.

You often work with the public, as when homeowners come to your office for a permit to construct a fence or a structure where you might be involved in working out compromises with neighbors. You might work with the business community to attract and retain businesses and assure their attractive design and placement in neighborhoods. You could work to make sure that a community has enough parks and recreational facilities and that they are in the right locations.

Distinctive Features at Miami

Emphasis on applied work: Miami's program prepares you to work as a city planner, emphasizing actual practice rather than just theory and philosophy. The program's faculty often serve on city and county planning and advisory boards. Their experience gives students insight into the workings of governmental agencies.

Hands-on learning: Beginning with the first course in the program, you will learn to master the tools used in the profession. The program's two excellent computer labs have an outstanding quality and variety of hardware and a breadth of software programs, including the industry standard GIS (Geographic Information Systems).

Your Program of Study

The urban and regional planning program at Miami offers a combination of academic theory and practical techniques to enhance your ability to understand the complex urban environment. This interdisciplinary major is administered by the Department of Geography.

The geography department offers the core courses, and you take supplemental work in a variety of other departments: architecture; economics; history; mathematics and statistics; political science; sociology, gerontology, and anthropology; and computer science and systems analysis. Required courses are in five general areas: planning principles, development issues, social issues, administration and politics, and analytic techniques.

In your freshman and sophomore years, you take liberal education courses as well as introductory courses in urban and regional planning.

Students often arrange an internship in the summer between your junior and senior years, usually in hometown agencies or offices. Students can also get internship experience during the academic year at the city planners' offices in Oxford, Hamilton, or Middletown.

In your junior and senior years, you focus on courses in the major as well as related electives.

Student Organization

The Geography and Urban and Regional Planning Society is a student group that combines students with interests in both academic areas. Presentations are given by professionals in the field and staff from Miami's Career Planning and Placement Office concerning internships, graduate schools, and career issues. You can also participate in field trips, discussions with alumni, and social activities.

Careers

Graduates with an A.B. in Urban and Regional Planning usually do one of two things: some go to graduate school for a master's degree and others find planning jobs. About a third of Miami's planning graduates attend graduate school. Many first get experience working then go to graduate school in their late 20s. In fact, many graduate programs and their financial support are geared toward students who have first worked in the field. Miami graduates most frequently attend Ohio State, but other schools they attend include North Carolina, Georgia Tech, and Kansas.

For those graduates who prefer to secure a job in planning, opportunities exist in a variety of places. Planning takes place in public, nonprofit, and private settings.

Nationally, three-fourths of graduates in planning go into government offices. At the local government level, municipal redevelopment, planning, public works, housing, and transportation departments are concerned about regulating the development of housing, roads, industry, and recreational spaces, as well as social services such as health care and education.

State planners may be involved in the formulation of environmental policy and administration of transportation, housing, community development, criminal justice, and other programs. Regional planners work with public agencies, councils of government, and special districts to coordinate the activities of local government.

Some graduates go into nonprofit organizations such as Americorps, the Peace Corps, and environmental action groups. Nonprofit groups are concerned with the provision of modestly priced housing and other social services.

Private consulting firms and divisions of major corporations plan the location of new facilities, the application of new technology, and the appropriate policies for local governments.

The typical Miami Urban and Regional Planning graduate has found a planning job in a Midwestern small town, county, or other local government. Recent graduates hold planning jobs with the Ohio cities of Milford and Oxford; Cuyahoga and Guernsey counties; the Ohio Department of Development; Burgess and Niple (consultants planning new transportation systems); and Thompson and Associates (consultants to businesses finding retail locations).

For More Information

For general information about Miami University, please contact:

Office of Admission
301 S. Campus Ave.
Miami University
Oxford, Ohio 45056-3434
513-529-2531 (v/t)
www.muohio.edu/requestinfo

For specific information on the Urban and Regional Planning major, please contact:

Department of Geography
Shideler Hall
Miami University
Oxford, Ohio 45056
513-529-5010
www.cas.muohio.edu/geo