I've noticed most of the discussion in the Student Lounge is directed towards career planning and graduate programs, but I was wondering if anyone (esp. undergraduates) have any student organizations on their campuses that deal with planning, urbanism, or housing issues?
Newbie poster here...
I am currently enrolled at Morgan State U.'s City and Regional Planning program and we have a urban planning student association.
I'm curious. Does your student's association advocate for planning issues in your community or is it more of an academic association?
I'm trying to organize a group on my campus that would educate students on urban issues and work to make positive change in the community, but I was looking to see what others in the planning community have been doing at their universities.
I would say it leans more towards being an academic organization. Some of the academic activities have included (1) the creation of listserv to keep the student body updated on department activities, job openings, etc.; (2) setting up social functions for the students; (3) appointing a student representative for the Maryland APA chapter; and (4) bringing in alumni to discuss their careers with students during association meetings and in some cases, classes.
Jmad1906, a Cyburbia member, is the president of Morgan State U's student planning association. I will ask him to post to give you a more detailed overview of the organization.
When I attended Sonoma State University we organized the first student planning organization. At my urging we named it the Student Planning Association (SPA). Well, they evolved to this...
http://www.sonoma.edu/ensp/icpa.htm
A good group of folks.
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I go to Cal Poly Pomona and we have the APSA (American Planning Student Association). It is also more of an academic organization as far as I can tell. They have meetings and go to conferences and stuff like that together.
I am at Wayne State University in Detroit and we have a student organization that is basically the same as the one at Morgan State that VFran described.
Some the PSO links in the Cyburbia Resource Directory are probablyout of date. I juat created a Planning student organization category in the PlanningWiki. Please feel free to edit it and add a link to your PSO.
http://planningwiki.cyburbia.org/Pla..._organizations
I find that PSO's (planning student organizations) at most schools are fundraisers for the APA National Conference. My undergraduate and graduate schools both tried to mix extra educational opportunities and bringing in spreakers and the such, but I think the main reason is fundraising.
This isn't all bad, since at the student rate going to the APA National Conference is affordable and probably as good of an educational experience as you can get (be it good or bad).
If you are interested in starting a new PSO, contact your SRC student representative or Susan Turner at APA and you can get some information as to what that will take.
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Nadie a las UCSC el campus de mucho environmental studies majors pero yo no quiero uno degree en las environment.
But hey, I don't even have the major here... So maybe I'll start one. . .
I appreciate everyone's comments. It seems to me that there a fair number of associations that focus on the planning profession from an academic standpoint and have associations with the APA, but I guess I would like to branch out a little bit. It's definitely important to have those institutions and I will probably start from there and see what can be done to broaden the message of those groups.
The hard thing for me is that I know I want to be a planner or work in planning, but I also know that isn't applicable to everyone. One thing I feel that is applicable to everyone is the choice to live in an urban setting versus a suburban or rural setting (and my predisposition is towards urbanism).
The organization I would seek to start would work on familiarizing students (who will most likely be moving to cities after graduation) with urban life. This means confronting urban issues on a larger level as well as advocating for certain planning practices immediately outside the campus community.
It doesn't sound like anyone has anything of this sort out there, which is both exciting and disappointing. If anyone is interested in how I go about this process I can post some progress updates. Likewise, if any of you Cyburbians out there have any advice or insight you want to pass along, feel free.
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