Week 2 at UIC's Master's Program in Urban Planning: A Student's Inside View

Matt Kuzma, who blogs over at Interesting and Helpful and comments here as "Kuz," recently embarked on a journey of urban planning education at the University of Illinois-Chicago. (Congratulations again, Matt!)

I asked him to give me the word about his new program. Here's what he said:

"I just finished Week 2 of my Masters in Urban Planning and Policy at UIC's College of Urban Planning and Public Administration. It's a 2-year program, with a choice of concentrations: Economic Development, Community Development, Urban Transportation, Physical Planning, and Globalization/International Development. I chose Economic Development, because I feel the classes in that area would be most applicable to a career in government, politics, or consulting.

I'm taking 3 required classes this semester -- 500, 502, and 504.

History and Theory of Planning with Brent Ryan has been very interesting so far. We'll be reading the actual Burnham "City Beautiful" plan next week, which should be fascinating. Our main text is "Cities of Tomorrow" by Peter Hall.

Planning Skills should be fun - We have 3 small groups that will be comparing two neighborhoods in the area using all sorts of data collecting and interviewing techniques, then putting together a presentation. That's with Ting-Wei Zhang. Our text is "The Planner's Use of Information" by Hemalata Dandekar.

Economic Analysis for Planning and Management is basic microeconomics 101, with planning applications at the end. My undergrad degree was in economics, so it's pretty repetitive for me, but we'll see how it goes. My professor is Saurav Bhatta.

I've been very impressed so far with the connections of the college administrative staff--it seems that there are 3-4 job or internship opportunities in my mailbox each and every day. I think this is going to open a lot of doors for me.

Thanks for asking!"

Thanks for telling! I look forward to future updates.