A recent investigation into universities in the United States and Canada reveals that while most institutions are incorporating climate change into the courses for aspiring urban planners, their methods of educating these future professionals about tackling, adjusting to, and building resilience against climate change differ significantly.
Urban and community planners play a crucial role in readying cities for the impacts of climate change. However, the question arises: are the programs offered by universities sufficiently equipping them for this challenge regarding mitigation, adaptation, and resilience? New research from the University of Kansas indicates that American and Canadian universities have made strides but show considerable variation in their approaches to climate change in the curriculum.
Addressing climate change in urban planning has been recognized as essential for some time, yet there has been a lack of established standards for implementation. To explore how planning programs address this issue, three researchers examined the integration of climate change into university curricula across North America.
Elisabeth Infield from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Mark Seasons from the University of Waterloo, and Ward Lyles, associate professor of public affairs & administration at KU, conducted a survey of over 100 universities. Their findings were published in the journal Planning Practice & Research.
The Canadian segment of the study indicated that planning programs typically cover fundamental climate science in specialized courses, with much of this content appearing within related disciplines such as geography. These courses often incorporate active learning, take into account local and regional contexts, and emphasize themes of social justice, equity, and vulnerability to risks. Moreover, there tends to be a greater focus on uncovering solutions rather than on physical science.
“It’s understandable that there’s been a shift in focus over the last two decades, as the scientific understanding of climate change is relatively established, and there’s no longer a need to bring people up to speed,” said Lyles. “In the past, discussions about halting climate change were more common; however, the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 made the urgency clear.”
The survey concerning U.S. programs revealed a significant increase in the number of institutions offering dedicated climate change courses, nearly doubling from 2010 to 2023. These courses can be found in both traditionally Republican and Democratic states across the country.
A third, combined study was conducted to identify the various climate change-related content provided in accredited planning programs in both the U.S. and Canada, as well as to identify factors that could either support or hinder its inclusion in the curriculum. Program directors and faculty members reported that over 60% of programs offer semester-long electives on climate change, followed closely by mandatory modules related to this topic. Additionally, most respondents indicated a greater emphasis on adaptation rather than mitigation, with students and faculty pushing for the integration of this topic more than administrators or potential employers.
These three studies collectively show that urban planning programs in the U.S. and Canada are increasingly treating climate change as a core subject in their education. Most programs include it within existing courses, often as electives. However, there are challenges regarding the depth of coverage and how to effectively incorporate the topic across various areas of planning. Typically, the emphasis falls more on adaptation than on mitigation or resilience within community planning.
“We believe that no student should graduate from a planning program without having fully addressed climate change,” Lyles stated. “It is important to have a dedicated course on climate change, but we also need to explore how it can be integrated across all elements of urban planning education.”
The authors put forth a series of recommendations:
- Mandate core climate change courses in both planning education and practice.
- Monitor whether accredited planning programs meet curriculum requirements related to climate change.
- Enhance opportunities for cross-program and international exchanges on teaching the topic.
- Broaden the approach beyond traditional methods aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions and adapting to climate impacts, placing greater emphasis on equity and justice in transformative planning.
- Set a leading example to highlight the urgency of both mitigation and adaptation, ensuring integration into existing coursework.
Lyles emphasized that tackling this topic, particularly with younger individuals who will become the next generation of planners, is both practically and emotionally challenging but essential for the profession. Future planners will face the duty of deciding how community resources will be utilized and how cities will be structured to endure the increasingly severe consequences of climate change.
“We noticed a lack of focus on how to communicate with young people about their relatively minimal contribution to climate change when they’ve been constantly informed about the world’s precarious situation. How should we teach them about these issues? Feelings of despair rarely motivate action,” Lyles noted. “Our goal is to equip planners to make ethical decisions and lead community discussions, which requires a significant amount of emotional intelligence. There are many difficult topics to address, and we need to improve on this front.”
