HS junior: urban planning/geography Starting search

College Search & Selection
1

<p>I have doing some reading about careers and have decided that straight architecture is not what I think I want to do. I want to be involved with urban planning (esp small towns) with a focus on historical preservation of those places and helping to repurpose urban areas and make them become a place people would want to live in again. </p>

<p>I have read a lot about what you need to do to become an urban and community planner, but need some advice as for my best plan to get there. I could go for an undergraduate Urban planning degree (and then a Master's in it) or go for a related degree - for me human geography seems like an interesting field- and then get my master's in urban planning. With my interests in history of areas and its people, which would be the best path?</p>

<p>As far as schools, I live in Virginia. We have both UVA and VT that offer the UG Urban and Regional planning degree. It is hard to tell the difference in the focus of each school by reading their curriculums. Does anyone with experience know? They are both great schools and I will be applying to each I think. Both are very hard to get into, though, and I want to have other options as well. </p>

<p>What schools offer good Human geography programs that have the potential for good out of state merit aid? I could not afford an out of state school at full price, in fact, I will need to get it in line with what I would pay in state. I saw the mention of LSU on anther thread, and it looks like it has a very interesting program in that. </p>

<p>Also, I saw a mention somewhere about Iowa State and its undergraduate urban planning program. Is it a strong program? Would it have a different focus than VT or UVA and does it have a good reputation for out of state aid? Are there any others? I would like to go to a school that has great school spirit, is fairly conservative, nice people, and has good weather ( I wouldn't like cold weather for most of the school year- no NE schools please). </p>

<p>Thanks for any advice that you all could offer and have a nice day!</p>

2

<p>You are in a similar situation to my son…we are not willing to pay much more than our instate flagships cost. So you need to find OOS schools that provide good merit aid. Some that I have found to provide good OOS merit include:</p>

<p>Ole Miss
LSU
South Carolina
Alabama
Wyoming
Montana State</p>

<p>You will have to check what kind of programs they have.</p>

<p>Iowa State provides some merit aid to OOS students but is by no means warm.</p>

3

<p>A note about planning degrees…</p>

<p>You may have noticed in your research that there are 2 types of planning programs…design based ones and policy ones.</p>

<p>Design programs are typically in a college of design/architecture and require you to take their design core. The Iowa State program is design based.</p>

<p>Policy programs typically do not involve design courses and are generally more similar to a geography major.</p>

<p>Planning careers do not require a grad degree but to not have one would be a mistake.</p>

<p>You may have a difficult tie moving from a policy undergrad program to a design grad program.</p>

4

<p>We’re in the same boat.</p>

5

<p>Ohio State and Miami of Ohio.</p>