 Hello everyone. Good evening, good morning, good day, wherever you are. Welcome. I'm Wei Ping Wu and the Director of the Master of Science in Urban Planning program at Columbia University. So first a big welcome. Very much wish we could have done this in person but our students are together in person on campus, the beautiful campus you're seeing a little bit here. And so we are very hopeful on our ability to welcome many of you. Next year in person right. So, in the next hour or so, you know, I will also have a panel of students joining me to answer some of your questions. Some of you have sent it in ahead of time, as well as some questions that are generally on the minds of prospective students. Before we do that, let me introduce our program in probably 30 minutes, and I would encourage you to put down questions in the chat box. And also after my presentation, I will all open up the floor for Q&A as well. Bear with me first. Let me introduce the program so that many of the questions actually get to be answered through that. So welcome again to Urban Planning program at Columbia University. This is a very special time in the sense lots is at stake for, you know, our cities, our communities and people who live in there. And certainly for the field of planning, lots are at stake. And so I very much applaud you for having thought about coming to study planning and coming to study at Columbia. And those issues that are really critical at this time of crisis. There are many, but I say there are at least two that are most critical and those really are at the center of our curriculum. The first is really inequality. And so you're coming to New York City, it's a great and dynamic global city, but it is also one of the most unequal cities in the world. And so this shows you how some neighborhoods are much better off economically than others, right. And then on top of that, let's look at COVID. This is New York City data on COVID percentage of residents infected with COVID, right. And these data of course evolve as we move through COVID and really embrace type of situation where we live with COVID. So you can see just look at Manhattan, and those are blue or right on the one map, a much lighter on the other, which means they have much less COVID. So inequality. So climate crisis is another key issue at the heart of the crisis we're facing today, and how planning can be part of the solution. And New York City of course has considered many ways and increasingly more urgent ways to address climate crisis and that you can see this is one of the examples of what we call rebuilt by design. And other ways that being considered and implemented, sometimes more on a piecemeal basis. So social, racial and climate justice really is at the center of our curriculum, not only in the planning program, but more importantly, at GSAP across the school. We are doing a number of systematic efforts to reimagine curriculum and programming. We have a task force of faculty to address that I happen to be on that task force, and really rethinking many other issues related to the built environment professions that we need to confront in terms of racism and racist practices in urban planning. That's also very much the case. In fact, I would say the planning profession has confronted these issues perhaps for a while now, and even considering the history of planning in the making of some state violence, particularly through regulations. And so, you can see we've been asking students to read about these more intensively, and we've been trying to innovate our curriculum to address these issues. So just to give you a quick sense in the last two to three years, we've actually created a number of new courses or reimagined some existing courses. And you can see the focus on climate crisis climate adaptation, reimagining the planning framework at local and higher scales to really work with neighborhoods, communities, cities and higher level stakeholders to address climate crisis. And we also are confronting the opportunities and challenges brought by technology, big data, and urban science for the profession. And then we are looking at how we can do more, not only recognizing racism and inequality, but also to help our students learn to have really skills and some solutions or at least ways to look for solutions to begin address these critical challenges of our time. So these are in our curriculum, but you can also see I don't know if you can see it well I hope you can that extra curriculum, we have lecture series that really invite many scholars practitioners to discuss and the students and faculty and this is just for this fall. And every semester, every Tuesday, we have these lecture series. So that's, that's really something that brought by the crisis and COVID, all of which that we are very keen to be to bring to our curriculum. That said, our program also has a very long history, and that history is rich contextual, as well as informative. So as you can see, we started basically issuing degrees around 1935. Although before that it was less of a degree more of a specialization. And then we also had the PhD program and the urban planning program at Columbia has evolved over time and has taken on a number of very critical and prominent areas of focus and I will speak about them in just a little bit. And on this chart, you can actually see a little bit right the issues of justice and global outlook really come up quite frequently. So these are some research and publications by our current and or immediately have immediate past faculty and you can see the kind of research and scholarship we generate from the full time faculty. We have a relatively moderate size of full time faculty right and a handful six and we were looking forward to have all six of them. Our next four in fact might be even more to complement that team of dedicated full time faculty. We have a really I'm very proud of a group of dedicated and seasoned practitioners who have had experiences in the public sector private sector nonprofit and international organizations who then come and teach sometimes one sometimes two courses, and who have been with us for number of years some newer than others, but very much connected so our curriculum is very much connected and anchored in practices through connections that these practitioners bring to the classroom, but also to professional development of our students and career opportunities at their workplace. So I am just actually giving you an example, you know about a dozen or so of our adjunct faculty, and I would encourage you to check out our program booklet. And so Emily Younger our program manager is going to drop a link in the chat box for you. And the program booklet, it is also on the open house page for our program as well as the program landing page. In there you will have a fuller list of all of the adjunct faculty as well as the full time faculty what they do, and what they study what they work on and how you can connect your interests with theirs. So very quickly that booklet also specifies the kind of curriculum we have for the master's degree program right so we are PAB accredited with two year program requiring at least 60 points, basically four semesters of full time study. We require 27 points, not courses right I apologize should be points, core requirements 27 points. And that includes courses, studio in the second semester of first year, and then either a thesis or capstone in the second year. And then so it's a quite a flexible curriculum which means you spend a lot more time actually on electives so 33 points are elective, at least 12 points should be in the concentration, which, you know, we have four concentrations they are really the strength of our program I will explain in just a little bit. And then, basically 33 minus 12 you have another 21 credits, or points, which are all both these two terms are very very similar, that you can take across CSAP, or Columbia. And so our full concentrations are built environment, community and economic development, international planning and development, and last but not least urban analytics, and we do not try to be a planning program that covers everything. So if you have any questions about areas, whether we cover it or not please, you know, jot down or ask us later, we really try to focus on our critical strength, as well as the prominent challenges of the day. And we also have a part time option. Those are really open only to people who have already had eight, I'm sorry, two year full time or four year part time experience prior to application. So that's important. The details are on our website. So check them out. And essentially you take twice as long as the full time option. So if you have any questions also let us know. So as you can see, the first year, you are very much engaged in required curriculum, and almost all of the require courses are taught by our full time faculty, which really anchor our programs curriculum. So four values, knowledge and skills. And so that will be history and theory of planning GIS planning methods, right, and then the second semester you would take economics for planning for planners, planning law and planning studio studio is actually an excellent planning method and mechanism somewhat different from your typical courses and somewhat similar to architecture studios. The key difference is our studios are always collaborative and teamwork, and we'll have a real client and a real project and engagement with stakeholders. So in a way it's some programs may call it fill projects. Alright, and some programs may call it client projects. So kind of similar but ours is very much team based. And so in your in the second year students have a lot of room to take electives pursue their concentration and other interests and thesis and capstone so you take either thesis or capstone. It's two semester sequence. So, you get to work on something in depth on your own individually to either prepare for your professional career, or to prepare to become a doctor student down the road researcher, or to learn a new skill, or to work directly with a client. And then with that in mind, we also have a lot of cross disciplinary connections, both within GSAP. You can see we have dual degrees with MR master of architecture, historic preservation and real estate development, as well as across Columbia. You can certainly we have we are having one more students who want to cross train so they are involved in dual degree programs but you don't have to, you can take courses. In fact, at GSAP, all of the electives in all of the programs are open to all students in GSAP. With other schools, you just need to be more strategic, we provide a list of relevant courses to all our students for outside of GSAP. So, any questions about that feel free to jot down or ask later. So you can see this school law school, social work, public health, and international affairs, we all have dual degrees. And so, for the four concentrations, and we generally organize our courses along those lines. And then you can see we built environment is probably the most heavily subscribed concentration. Our students, as well as because we're in the design school. And so we are connected with architecture and other designers and so you have interaction with other students as well. And you can see here any courses that have a star next to it count for two concentrations. So that's the strategic way that you will want to plan your study program for the two years or four semesters you are here. And you probably can see some of the courses on my early slide are new, and others are more core and I'm around for a little bit. And then so the kind of work that you can do in studio related to built environment. This is Long Island City Waterfront Studio, spring of 2020. In fact, there's been a lot of featuring of Long Island City now becoming regenerated or revitalized, particularly through immigrants, as well as, you know, second generation immigrants, Asian Americans is very interesting, formerly industrial area that's now undergoing in a sense what we call revitalization. And the economic development are is our second concentration. And in there we particularly emphasize the issue of social justice and racial justice, and how that manifest in the built environment in the planning process, and in community and for instance, we have I'm really quite proud of a new course we have this semester, called a community development finance practicum really get students to work with community organizations to try to develop strategies and and sources of finance for development projects. And this example also has been ongoing for two years now, particularly in these virtual environment last year to work with the school in Washington Heights, just, you know, north and around Harlem to really look at how environmental issues as reflected in street network and infrastructure can be addressed by residents users around the area so you can see how students work with high school students to envision for that neighborhood and for the thorough fare that runs through the neighborhood. So international planning and development, you know, in a sense it's a little bit paradoxical we even have a separate concentration. Really, it's more to organize courses. Really, you know, if you look at built environment courses some already have international contents, economic development courses, we should too, but in our international planning and development concentration. We address issues that are not necessarily in the other concentrations, for instance, we look at, you know, a climate change at a global scale. We also look at the crossing overs of people through migration the crossing overs of capital through investment, and how these global flows and climate practices, and not only in, you know, cities like New York or London that are very global, but also more importantly actually in cities in the global south, and how the imbalance of power and connections affect different places in different ways. And that's one theme in the international planning and development concentration. The other is really about so we know many planning practices in the past have sort of generated or originated from the global north right so think about zoning, think about transit oriented development, right. And then, you know, we in the planning, there was this perception that the global south could really learn from these experiences, but we know, especially during COVID, but even before that, that the global south has really, you know, countries and cities in those regions, really have been very innovative in terms of using limited resources and using different kinds of planning processes to create solutions, or, you know, resolutions to confront similar kinds of urban challenges so think about participatory budgeting right that originated from Brazil. And, you know, think about bus rapid transit. Okay, also, you know, different city in Brazil. And then Bogotar and now more and more in other cities in the global south, because building some ways simply is too expensive and technologically very demanding. And for many cities in the global south, that is not a good solution. So we now see that global north cities are more and more looking to the global south for these kinds of important and pragmatic solutions. And so this kind of what we call international planning is really not to say we're going to transfer or just carry certain practices in different places to another set of places, but to really try to understand what has made participatory budgeting or bus rapid transit worked in their originating places, and how they may or may not work well in another place given the different and unique political and social economic context of that second set of places. So we really try to help our students understand that there aren't often time ready made solutions that are portable to understand the nature of the solution and the nature of the problem, and the nature of, you know, some of these transfer of planning practices is really more than just knowing about these practices. So you can see the kind of courses we offer here. When what when we were able to travel we every year we had a couple of travel studios and we are very hopeful by next spring, this may resume. In the pandemic where we were able to travel to international locations. We are hoping at least in the spring we might be able to do domestic travel and maybe even international but you all know challenges abound and the. So we have to be agile, and much like our curriculum is agile. And so urban analytics is our newest concentration, and it's really been growing and I am very excited and very proud of our growth in the last few years. And yes, the number of courses is still smaller than the other concentrations. The number of courses that deal with the fundamentals that deal with machine learning a little bit more advanced data analytics, and then that deal with using digital platforms for prototyping planning products, meaning sort of a small scale solutions that can help either process or planning decision making, and then last but not least we have a new course this semester called urban analytics analytics and human centered decision making also working with the clients one in Brazil one in Harlem, of course, virtually with Brazil to really use data analytics to inform decision making. So, there are also courses at Gisa, offered by the visual studies program that also count for some urban analytics, for analytics concentration. So all the courses you've just seen are just urban planning courses. There are other courses in the school I have not included but we will share with students once they matriculate. Right. So we have a couple of skill based courses that are really important, and, and very popular among students. One on professional skills and communication or one on project management. So we do want to. So generally I would tell students, we try to prepare students to become generalists. We know many subjects in planning and with some deep understanding of either one or two directions, right. So you can see the kind of work that students have done with analytics in the context of climate change. And the kind of presentation and visualization skills our students have it are really quite impressive. And this is more spatial analysis in GS. So curriculum is not the only asset we have really important is we want to help students get ready to be emerging professionals, not only in jobs that are typical of urban planning graduates, but also in emerging types of jobs that should benefit that could really benefit from planning skills and values and I will show you a little bit of what they are in in just a minute, a minute or so. So we do that through a set of efforts to help our students so advising and mentoring. So Emily Younger, many of you probably have been touched with her and so I would encourage you to reach out if you have really deep questions after you have reviewed the program booklet and you still want to know more or you want to potentially talk to a professor. Unfortunately, we cannot invite you to be on campus and sit in the class this semester. So we'll need to find other ways to connect you. So we will, once students are admitted, we will connect admitted students with current students one on one as well. So you can see here, Emily and I provide a lot of advising to students both in groups as well in as well as in person individually. Then we have our full time faculty, each helps a group of students as a faculty advisor of course they meet usually individually, and then in the second year each student will have a thesis or capstone advisor. We also have student mentors with extracurricular help that include workshops, office hours and help with student work. And so this semester we have two student mentors, one in more presentation and writing skills, the other more data and coding skills. Last but not least, we have a mentorship program connecting current student with alumni one on one. Usually in the second year but some first year students like to do that. And so that has been quite successful we have been doing that for the last few years already. So as we help our students getting ready for careers that they want after graduation. We have identified a number of career paths for our students as you can see from this slide and you know this this session is being recorded and we will put the recording on our website so you can see this little more in detail when you have time. And so you can see, this is just the first six of the about 12,000 or so career path that we have identified based on survey of our recent alums so basically in the last five years right so you can see they not only work in traditional planning kinds of positions but also in emerging kinds of positions, especially as we go to the second page right. So, you know, consulting firms real estate firm, urban tech firms or even just tech firm, right. And certainly doctoral studies every year we have one, one of few students go apply and my summer success successful but not all are successful so if you have any questions about that, I'm happy to answer as well. And so we this again of course was prior to pandemic. We are using different ways to host career fairs to engage students with prospective employers. These career fairs are usually held in a form of what we call informational interviews and so they are not the same as let's say this school sometimes law school where people actually hire students right off the bat, but it's really more about understanding these organizations and really setting up contact right. And this is our lovely planning lounge. I'm very happy that it has returned to its original form which is this during pandemic it was really used just as computer lab and so we have about 3035 computers in the lounge which you don't see because this is an area where some people actually lounge around so we have two other rooms in the suite, one is computer lab and one is the classroom so students really hang out there a lot. This is sort of their community. And this is the kind of work our students are able to create in a data analytics and GS advanced yet will be called advanced spatial analysis and our students also have quite a bit extra extra curriculum like as you will call it activities so this is an urban magazine, the students produce once every semester they produce an issue. And they've been ongoing for decades now so it's really an excellent way of honing your skills and engage in conversations or debates with your colleagues and even sometimes faculty and sometimes colleagues from other schools. So, I know you all are interested and so I have to say a few words about the application and mission process so we're towards the end of my presentation. So, we really give a very comprehensive type of review to each application. So this year of course GRE is not required. I had a question from someone who said, Oh, what is your average GPA. For admitted students. We actually, that's just one indicator, we do not really get fixated on that if so we actually don't calculate average GPA for admitted students. But I general generally I think you know above three is probably quite strong. And so our students also come from a variety of backgrounds, some directly out of school so I have another question of asking whether I could, you know, a student could go on to graduate school directly from after graduating college. The answer is a qualified. Yes. Yes, we definitely have students who are just out of college. But generally during college they have had some relevant experience through internship. When I say relevant I don't mean they necessarily needs to be in planning but it could be in engineering, it could be in biology or environmental studies and going on field work but something related to how the real world, you know, works right something that gets you to think about what you're interested in in studying once you come here so we really would like you to kind of show us some experience relevant to planning field and now we will value that we also very much value recommendation letters from your professors or former professors on your academic preparation and some of you may have worked in the world for a while in the real world for a while and that we very much value and so if you have recommendation letters from your supervisors or colleagues that's very good, but at least please one out of three letters at least one letter should be about your academic preparation. And so that's important so we looked at all of these. And so, let me just say a few words about the personal statement, and that is really, really important now that you know we don't ask for GRE, we certainly will look at your transcript look at your, if you have a sample of writing, or the kind of courses you've taken before coming to graduate school, but we really want to learn from your personal statement, and your understanding of the planning field. So, what do you want to come to planning right, what do you want to do after you get a graduate degree in planning. So what kinds of planning issues are at the center of your interest, you know you might have primary interest you might have secondary interest. Tell us all. Actually, we don't mind if it's a little bit longer they than 800 words, but it should definitely not be just 300 words. Right. I mean that that you're not going to be able to tell us much in that. We also would like you, we are now at a mission website, this one is specified, we would like you to tell us about your experience with analytical reasoning. We can include but not limited to statistics, or even econometrics, GS data analysis or analytics big data, or qualitative methods. As I mentioned our students come from all over. You know, the various different academic fields right, all the way from arts, photography, Emily started studying photography, she can tell you an undergrad, and anthropology sociology political science geography, urban studies environmental studies and cultural studies communication so that's all of them are social sciences, humanity side. We also have students come from business from economics, then the even more towards engineering, civil engineering, very common civil engineering is quite common, and then sciences right biology, some even physics, math, all possible we have students really from all over the map. And so we want to know how you think your experiences relevant. And then so last but not least, we have been increasing financial aid to students, certainly you know federal financial aid in terms in the form of loans and work studies, this of course are confined to us students, but our scholarships are available to both us and international students. These fellowships, or what we call scholarships are based on both needs and merit so we really want to help talented students who are challenged in terms of financial resources to be able to pursue the education they want you. Columbia is expensive, I very much recognize that. And we know that we have to do better in terms of making more scholarships available so another form of financial assistance is through a research assistant or teaching assistance, assistance. And these are usually more available to second year students because they have already taken those courses and we know them better, but occasionally, a few first year students can get these and these are competitive. And these also allow you to apply for assistantship, maybe not even in planning program like Bill Center at GSAP basically recruits RAs from across the school. Okay, so that's the financial aid part. So last but not least, I would love for you to really read these two web pages carefully thoroughly before you reach out with questions by email. And I think lots of questions would have been answered by those two pages the first two pages right the first page that I show here is the landing page of our program. The second page is from a set of information that is specifically targeted at you, our prospective students. And actually I find that page to be quite a bit more useful right and the booklet is there student work examples of their recordings of our weekly lecture series is there. The third link is for students who would like to get assistance on your application. We really try to give our current students autonomy on that so this is a student organized effort. There's nothing to do with the application process or the admission process so if you do get assistance. That's great, but that doesn't give any advantage or disadvantage in the application process. So if you go through that page, you can fill out a form. Emily doesn't see it. I do not see it. Nobody in the mission office sees it. And so that goes straight to a number of student volunteers through our program council which is, which is a student organization so if you have any question one of their officers will be in the panel in a few minutes where you can ask him. They do have a first come first serve principle, because, you know, as semester progresses towards the end that they get pretty busy. And so they're going to try to help as much as they can. And so, especially for those of you who lack financial or other resources to put together a strong application. As I said, I think I went a little bit over time but we still have quite a bit time almost close to an hour, at least to answer your question so let me stop sharing. And, and then I can see your faces and we can answer some of your questions. Okay, so it looks like we don't have any questions in the chat box. It's probably easier to put in the chat box it's a lot harder with more than three screens, or actually we have four screens to really try to see your hand so. I see a rusa and then Isaiah. Okay, great. Yeah. Yeah, I was just about to type them in in chat. So I was, I was wondering about students in the urban planning program that have chosen to do a dual degree. I am a little bit interested in doing a dual degree with the program in real estate and I was wondering if you guys have any perspective as how you know how strenuous or taxing is it to do a dual degree program, or is it is it pretty doable, or just what is your experience with students trying to do that. Yeah, excellent so what I should do is actually to introduce our panel of students because they may be able to answer your questions better than I do or then Emily does. So if we could do that and I will just kind of throw some questions so I know we have one student is meeting here. Yeah, so she does she has a dual degree, not real estate but public health but very similar in terms of structure of the dual degree program So before I asked her to answer your question. Let me introduce, let me ask our current students to introduce each of you by yourself, and I think that will just kind of make asking questions a little easier so let me just look at the screen so I first see so first Emily Emily you should introduce yourself first. Hi everyone, I'm Emily younger I'm the program manager for urban planning. I'm also an alumni of G SAP I did both the urban planning and the historic preservation program so I do have experience as a dual degree student at G SAP. I've gone through the thesis process the studio everything so I can also answer your questions as an alumni of the program and also from the administrative perspective, since I've now been managing the program for over a year. And Derek. Hi everyone. I am a second year UP student. My concentrations are in built environment and community and economic development. So I'm interested in housing, housing policy homelessness issues. I'm also on program console. So I'm actually helping organize that program that way ping mentioned at the end of her presentation to provide support for for applications. That's me. Hello everyone. Thanks for tuning in tonight. I'm also a second year student in the urban planning program. And my background before coming to Columbia I was in natural resource conservation and disaster recovery planning. I actually met students from doing their studio project in Puerto Rico and that's how I got into contact with Columbia and that's why I submitted an application. So that also brought me to my concentration which is international planning and urban analytics. Also I'm the co director of Latin GSAP which I guess the main goal is to bring students together in GSAP whether you're in planning architecture urban design and real estate development if you're from Latin American country or if you're like me or American but you're Latino. So if you have questions about that let me know and it's nice to meet you. Thank you. Mauricio. Hi everyone. My name is Mauricio. I'm a second year urban planning student my concentration is in urban analytics. Also I'm from Peru. And what currently I'm also working as a coding and programming mentor. And yeah, thank you. Yep. Sorry. Hi everyone. My name is Hori. I'm originally from Seoul, South Korea. My concentrations are urban analytics and community economic development. I am an international student so I can answer some questions about that. And also I'm doing capstone for graduation so I can also take some questions about that too. Thank you. Great. And Yuning. Hi, I'm Yuning and I'm a second year urban planning students. So this is my last semester here with the urban planning program. I finished a year in the public health school. My concentration with the urban planning program is urban analytics. And my department at Moment is the public school, public health school is environmental health sciences. So I can ask, I can try to answer questions regarding due degree and I'm also an international student as well. Great. So let me get back to Arusa, your question about dual degree with real estate program. So we don't have any students, although you can see our five students have a variety of interests and, you know, kind of coverage regional origin, national origin. So that's how we hope we can answer a lot of your questions. And so with, so real estate is a three semester, essentially one year program, right, using summer. So for planning students who do dual degree with the real estate, essentially you would need to start taking classes the first summer, meaning after you finish fall and spring the first summer. You can start or you can start the second summer but that's a little bit too late. Usually people start the first summer. And you just need actually one additional semester so you would need two years plus a fall semester. And that's what basically you need is doing right. You're doing just one additional semester. Yes. And can you tell us also because that's how our real estate does. So what did you say the program over the summer. Did you take courses in public health over the summer. No, so with public health, it's only one, it's only one year, but they do require you to do a practical or depends on your department so that that that just depend on your department department for department of environmental science they require practicum and for some other departments. I don't know if it. Yeah, that you can also write in DC, the thesis, and that's people usually do that over the summer. Great. Thank you. Emily I'll let you moderate which question we should talk to. Let's hear from Isaiah since he had his hand raised and then I'll go into the chat box questions and in the order they were received. Great. Yep, let's do that. Hi. I'm sorry, excuse my background. Just had a quick question about the relationship. The relationship that Columbia and the urban planning program as a whole has in relationship to the community of Harlem, or upper Manhattan in general, I mean as like a school urban planning. We all know that Columbia is one of the largest gentrifying forces in that in that area of the city and so there's a way that the university is contextualizing that even within the program itself. And that's a really important question and especially in the last two years, I have really generated a lot of rethinking and reckoning, and you absolutely right the relationship between the university and the community is a very complex one, oftentimes very contentious, and oftentimes quite challenging for the community around us. So, we, in the planning program, take a very much of starting point as what we call on learning whiteness, you know Columbia has been a very white institution for a long time. And that is true also with GSAP. And so in the last couple years we really trying to rethink how we should be engaging with Harlem, the community. So we start the university, another university actually the university has had a program for a while, but our school just started a new program called the community fellows. In fact, the students will get to meet the two fellows in the next month or so. And so we trying to really invite the community into our school of course at the small scale right now. And then that one course I described as climate justice in our own backyard is really inviting the students in working together. And then we have a practicum called engagement and planning in Harlem, and that involves a historian who has worked on Harlem history for a long time and we're going to re offer that course in the spring because in during the pandemic it was very difficult to go, you know, sort of into the community. So we really try to be more mindful of how much harm that Columbia has done and how important it is to be really talking to residents there and not have any preconceptions of what's best for the community. So this practicum will be led by two practitioners who have done a lot of work in Harlem and hope and taking students to meet and connect with both community board as well as residents. Yeah. And does that I see your question, Isaiah. It does. I was wondering also from a student perspective how that, you know, because we have like a really diverse sort of panel of students here and how they are also embodying that as well as taking through that. Thank you though. Yep. Any takers. I mean, I'll go. Yes, we have our practicums as well as our student projects I think that's a little more academic but also through the student groups we do have volunteer opportunities are just forums to have the chance to also connect with Harlem as well. Okay, great. Okay, I'm going through okay. All right difference between capstone and thesis. I'm sorry Emily. Same one I was going to go to. Okay. Yeah, how do you prepare students for different postgraduate work. Yes. So thesis used to be the only option for students and we added the capstone just two years ago. So we don't have a lot of capstone, you know, kind of projects to look back on yet, but this year I think there are a number of them. Generally thesis is a more research oriented, and it's what we call propositional based research process that are you trying to construct argument. And then you collect evidence and analyze the evidence or information or data, and to support your proposition right capstone is more practice anchored or real world anchored you know thesis can be real world anchored but thesis is not about what we call it a crystal ball it's not about the future it's more about the past or current capstone on the other hand can be about all of them, but oftentimes about the future right what do you do with environmental gentrification say around the high lines, what kind of strategies that communities along the high lines could take up, and it's a little bit similar to studio but it's individual based. And so that's the main difference. Capstone also can be in multiple ways of the final products delivery, it could be a app, it could be a model it could be a client report it could be a plan. So it's much more diverse in terms of a final delivery. How do you prepare students for differing postgraduate work that's a good question maybe I should give that to some of the students, what maybe more ratio you've done internship in Washington DC, maybe you can help us a little bit with that question. Yeah, so I was sorry for it. So I did an internship this summer at the World Bank, specifically at the branch called International Finance Corporation. It was mostly focused on how we can estimate the impact of green policies and different indicators for global south cities, especially given that there is no much data. For example, the program, most of the courses are studying New York and in New York we have a lot of data, but this is not a case in cities like Bangalore, Lima, Buenos Aires. So this project at the World Bank is focused on gathering the data from global south cities and estimated the green policies impact. And I will say like for example the program helped me in the way that so one of the greatest thing of the program is that we can craft our curriculum so we can choose which electives we think might be most useful for us and for our career. Thank you Mauricio and maybe sorry, I think you are in the community development planning fellowship program maybe you can tell us a little bit about that on how that could prepare you for what you want to do down the road. Yeah, sure. So currently I am a fellow community planning fellow for the fund of the city of New York. I am working for Manhattan Community Board to, and there I am in charge of us specific projects related to open streets program. And I have weekly meetings with people at the community board which is really great because you get to meet people who used to be in the field and you get a lot of advices and feedbacks about your projects. So I think it really helps me to figure out what I want to do after graduation and also think about all the planning issues in a more like community based perspective. So, yeah, yeah. Eric, you are in the program to right. Yeah, I am uning isn't as well, you happen to be at the same time. But yeah I'm in the same fellowship. So I'm working with Community Board for in Manhattan. And we are working on a really interesting project where we are looking at commercial vacancies in the district, and basically putting together a proposal for a city program to convert those commercial vacancies into supportive housing, affordable housing and homeless shelters, as well as turning retail space into, you know, health services and community amenities like that. It's almost like the continuation of your studio project. Yeah, exactly. It really like fell into place really well. But yeah, I love it for a lot of the same reasons sorry mentioned. It's a fantastic, like networking opportunity, you know, I'm meeting a lot of people who work in the field and, you know, just people who do like interesting stuff that they never knew about, you know, they're very hands on. Great. Yep. So let's move on to the next question is it possible to do a dual degree in urban design and planning. No, it's not possible, because the urban design program is what we call a post professional degree, which means you have to have a design undergrad, or actually civil engineering as well as its professional degree. In five years, you can get into urban design. So that's pretty difficult to ask urban planning students to do. So, for instance, we don't require a professional degree for our applicants right. So, because of that, then it's not possible to do a dual degree with urban design. But we do have course, very good course called urban design for planners. And in our studio, we at least have at least one or maybe two studio projects that are very much design oriented. And then we run extra curriculum workshops on some of the basic design software and you know, like SketchUp, AutoCAD, and so on. Okay, what do students typically do in the summer between their first and second year. So maybe I can ask you, Nien, and you already heard about Mauritius summer internship, maybe Kat, whoever wants to chime in. What do you do in the summer? Yeah, the first summer was during COVID. I had an internship with, I don't know if people heard of CFAD, it's like a lead building rating company. That was very difficult and was fully remote. And opportunities at the time was very limited. So I just had a ticket. This summer I had a really interesting internship with the department of city planning and their capital planning division. And that's like city provides a lot of internship opportunities, whether it's like during school year or summer. They're constrained, like they're usually six months. So it's, and they have like career developments and a lot of networking opportunities because they are, those opportunities are geared towards students who wanted to serve the city in the future. So those are great opportunities. And yeah, I think that's one thing like great with the New York City, there's just so many things that you can do, whether it's like city related or community boards, it's, you just have to look for it and find professors, as we've already mentioned, many of them are predictioners, and yeah, they can connect you to many of those resources as well. So yeah, just really quickly. So yeah, just about all of them have done summer internship. I just want to let you know that we do not have summer programming in terms of courses. We actually very much encourage our students to pursue internship, or to use summer to travel. We do have summer workshop, which only takes about two weeks, so you can still do internship and do summer workshop did any of you do a summer workshop this year. I was in the workshop at Douglas Woodward, and it was about residual spaces in New York City. And it was really, like, it was a great experience because we spent a year, spent a year through Zoom, and then it was our first chance to actually meet in person and like do a lot of field work in New York City. We saw we like went to Harlem, and also we had a field trip to a lot of like, probably owned public spaces in New York City. So, and yeah, and it was a really good chance to meet other students in other programs within GSAP like urban design students and also real estate development students so yeah I really enjoy the experience. Yeah, great. So next question is there option to submit a portfolio during the application process. Yes, but choose be told. We don't look at the portfolio quite carefully the same way as if you are applying for the master of architecture program or urban design program in planning portfolio is less critical. If anything, a writing sample would help us more. Really, the visual and visualization skills our students take are way beyond most, you know, planning students would have in many other planning programs. So it's definitely a plus but we don't require every single student to have those kind of visualization skills. Some students choose to focus more on writing, more, you know, big, you know, data analysis or a more qualitative approach. Yes, if you only get into dual program adult if you're applying for dual degrees you have to get in both degrees, not necessarily at the same time. So, many students actually say come into planning and then apply for public health during their first year in planning you name was that the case with you. Yes, but yes, and I think one thing to keep in mind is to take enough credits that first semester. Yeah, and we also have students, I believe we have another student who started a public health first, and then apply to get into planning. Yeah, so we could go either way. But you really do need to apply the very first year if you say get in the planning, and you want to do a dual with master of architecture, you really should be applying, you know, the first year of planning program otherwise it won't be dual degree it will be consecutive. Okay, at what point during the program those students choose that concentration so at the initial contact point, quote unquote is one students choose studios so all of these students have done studio in the spring. But in last November and December, when we presented that we pitched a different studio projects they choose, and then they can indicate what concentration or concentrations, because almost 40% also students choose to concentrations, and they intend to pursue. And then we try to match their studio projects with their intended concentration. Well, the real final confirmation is basically in another month or two in December, we will be asking all of these students now, what is your concentration so we want to make sure they have enough credits by next spring for at least one concentration. Okay. So do we do you need to pay concentration in the day our interest towards that in our personal statement. Yes or no. I always encourage our students to really explore in their first year, especially first semester, and really kind of see what it's all of interest to them, what is possible. And students often change so it really doesn't matter it's not going to make or break your application. Okay, are there other student organizations. Yes. So, cat and talked about the Latin GSAP and Derek, do you want to talk a little bit about program council. Yeah, so like I said earlier, I am a member of program council. We are kind of like a student government body, we kind of, we meet every week, and public meetings that are open to all students. Anyone can come by and kind of like give their feedback about things that are going on in the program, or, you know, the things that they would like to see happen. We coordinate events, we plan events, and we, and we throw events. And we also meet with the faculty at their meetings, pretty much once a month. And that kind of gives us an opportunity to be a liaison between the student body and the faculty. And, you know, communicate student needs and things going on with the students then, and vice versa. So yeah, and we also have an urban China network. Quite active they organize conferences they organize competition last year, and last semester, and then they organize career panel specifically catered to students who want to maybe go back to China. So they're also QSAP for basically queer students at GSOP. And then there's also black student organization. So I think Emily's dropped a link to the list of all organizations, student organizations at GSOP. We have about a handful in the planning program, and you are welcome to create one right so we have had students will create one. So for application fee waiver for international students it's generally targeted towards students from low resource countries and you should just go to our admissions page or Emily you can drop the email, the general admissions email. That's where you should send a request to we have not we don't really have the capacity to make the decision is the admissions office in the school that makes that decision. Okay, so for the applications optional but recommended work sample what may look like a student without a background in planning. Yeah. Your actually work sample is not required is completely optional. And it's totally fine to not have a work sample we have. In fact, the large percentage of applications do not have a work sample and it's really fine. You want to actually submit all the required materials. Well, I really put some time in in writing that personal statement get good. When I mean good recommendation letters I don't mean they should be just positive they should be detailed they should really speak to your academic preparation. So if you are interested in submit a architecture portfolio, feel free, but I can't, I can tell you, it won't break or make your application. Ah, Emily that is for you. The overlap if any between urban planning and HP dot degree. I would encourage anyone who's interested in doing the dual with HP and UP feel free to send me an email and I can tell you a little bit more about it but just to keep things short. And get to some of the other questions today I'm going to kind of generalize it to be more about any of the dual degrees within GSAP. So, the overlap comes a lot in the elective course work. When you do the dual degree with historic preservation and urban planning. There's really one course that like definitively overlaps between two programs and that is the dual studio course. So it's in the fall there's an urban planning and historic preservation studio which brings together urban planning students and historic preservation students. But then a lot of your other overlap is going to come from the elective courses so when you are enrolled in any program at GSAP, you can take electives across the different courses. So when you are in historic preservation urban planning, you might be mixing up your urban planning and historic preservation electives to kind of target them more specifically to your interest. I think for me personally I definitely took the elective courses that were in preservation that were related more to like preservation policy rather than the materials coursework, which usually tends to relate more to architecture but you know you can also take your history courses. There's a lot of cross disciplinary courses offered throughout GSAP where we bring together students from all of the programs. So, there's a lot of overlap in those ways. Yep. So how are students able to have two concentrations. Sorry, did I hear that you have two concentrations or cat. Yes, and I believe you addressed it that there are a lot of courses that overlap for instance urban analytics and human centered decision making I believe is one of them and also disaster planning is how I'm able to. You just have to be very strategic with how you plan your courses. Right. Yeah. Or you because you have a lot of room right. Right. 21 credits of worth of elective. You don't want to go beyond planning, you can just take more electives right in planning so the curriculum is pretty flexible in the sense of not requiring to take not requiring our students taking a lot of core courses. How large is the UP program so every year we try to construct a class of about 45 to 50 students. Sometimes we go overboard sometimes really go underboard right so, but so at any given time we have about 100 to 110 master students because like you know uning. She's been with us more than two years because she has to be over at public health for a little bit but we keep her, you know we keep in touch with her through all of the, you know, email communications, we consider her our students at all time. So, that's the general size than that there are about 20 PhD students who also interact with master students, especially, you know, many of the PhD students serve as teaching assistants to a required planning courses. Ah, would I recommend okay cat you could answer this question would you recommend this program for someone interested in environmental and climate change planning. I would because I think when you're coming from an environmental studies background there are a lot of planning aspects to it, and I think what's cool about this program is that you can go either learning more in the coding analytical visualization route or you can do more community management, and also the best part about doing your planning at Columbia is that you have New York City to work with you know there's if you don't find it, perhaps what you're looking for at Columbia or you want to go beyond the books, if you will, you can connect with an NGO and volunteer or you can intern. So I think that's so yes to answer your question. Yeah, for sure. So, someone is asking, do you encourage students to include writing sample and undergraduate work in place of professional portfolio. Um, it depends. So it's a qualified yes. Really, the writing sample should be strong, really should enhance your other materials for the application right. It does not don't include it right and sometimes actually may actually do the opposite, if the writing sample is rather weak. And, and also I would say the writing sample we prefer it not to be very long, you know, something like 10 pages is okay, even a five page, you know, like executive summary for the thesis you've written. It's good, or kind of client report you've written to an internship. We really want to see how you express yourself, you know your ideas, how you organize your writing, how much you understand about planning right so it's really optional. So Isaiah you're asking for the name of the fellowship that some of our students are in. Oh yeah so it's already answered the question great. How many students are admitted. Good question. Generally, our yield rate is about a third. That means, you know, if you have 50 students you admit roughly 150. I understand that you all making different choices visiting different schools, different programs, we want to make sure your interest matches with what we have to offer. I think this is an opportunity for me to ask a few of you current students why you choose Columbia urban planning so maybe I can ask Mauricio first, and we haven't turned to you for a little while now. Yeah, I would say like. So, as I said before, like one of the reasons is the opportunity to craft your curriculum as, as you want, like so as Columbia has a lot of schools. You can take courses all over Columbia opportunities of all over Columbia. And for example right now I'm in the International fellows program of SIPA. And I mean Columbia gives you like a lot of opportunities to and also like to apply to your own planning skills in the other courses and vision planning. That's one reason I know recently that I found is that the master program is not only focused on the practical side but also on the research side, which I find that it's very important if you want to tackle the challenges in an academic way in a more quantitative and qualitative way to understand the problems of planning. Yeah, I am very proud of our students I want to just be very honest that because our size of the class 50 right so you'll have a group of students who are like superbly. Well tuned to theoretical inquiries debates and you know our history and theory class and social in our spatial exclusion classes are like very theoretical and very kind of debate like seminars right. We have students who are really into to that that we have a group of students who are very very capable with big data, you know machine learning, you know, algorithm, whatever, right. Then we have another group of students who are very good with design, who are, you know, excellent with visualization. Then we have another group with a lot of climate expertise and passion. And they overlap in multiple ways right so there's never kind of a, they're separate in different silos and so I think it's a very kind of exciting space for I should have the students say that but that's what I you know as an instructor observe of our students. Okay, so to the student panel. Anybody wants to address this. If you didn't come from urban planning profession how did you approach writing a narrative in your personal statement to tie in your own skills and demonstrate your qualifications for MS up. I can pick that one up. I studied anthropology and sociology and underground. And then I took a few years renovating properties around St. Louis. So I mean neither of those are directly related to urban planning. But when I decided that urban planning was what I wanted to do and I wanted to go to grad school for it. And when I was putting together the application. I really just, you know, I thought a lot about what it was that I loved about those two kinds of like, you know, fields of my life and how they could be applied to urban planning, right. Mostly, like, with the intention of kind of demonstrating the, the perspective that I can offer the, the program and the perspective I can kind of bring to the classroom. So I think not having a background in urban planning is just fine. You just have to play it as a strength. Yes, thanks, Derek. So what types of writing does the mission look for in a writing sample for example is a research paper better than auto biographical wine. Yes, absolutely. So you really are very interested in your ideas about planning or the way that you write, but sometimes, as Derek said, you don't have a planning background. That's fine. You know, you have a sociology paper that's about family relations in a certain place. That's fine we understand how you write, understand how you organize ideas, how you express your ideas right. That's really what the writing sample is about. Sarah, I'm sorry, Emily's already answered sourced question. I didn't mention the next question about how specifically the admission committee is looking at the various components for your application. As I mentioned earlier, very comprehensive, we have primarily four criteria in reviewing applications one is academic preparation right do you have the necessary analytical skills, which you know the personal statement as you also to identify. And do you have, you know the basic writing skills that we look for your personal statement will show that. So the basic academic preparation, and then specifically your experience, it's a second criteria whether you know you have somewhat relevant experience either internship or work or some kind of volunteer work even, and that you have been engaging with the society, you know, beyond just your college school. And then next is what we call it. And so it's more specifically even looking at the kind of analytical skills you have. And then the last is sort of the fit with our program, what we have to offer. We occasionally have students who really wanting go into transportation modeling. Well, we're not the program to come to study that I mean we are very honest about that. We offer courses on transportation but more foundational and also in terms of looking accessibility less about mobility. So we approach transportation more from a sustainability point of view. So we don't have in depth to transportation modeling kinds of courses and so that might not be a good fit. And then I add to that in the same perspective so I just want to say you're out there and maybe perhaps you're worried about your GPA or how you perform academically. I was there, you know I'm not strong in that sense but that's fine. I think as long as you just give a narrative of who you are for instance, show more your people skills and give an example of that like when did you have to be give a consensus on building because you do that as a planner when did you have to be diplomatic like describe that when did you initiate a project at work. If you're again environmental studies, you know I was interested in soil and trees like how do I try to connect to the people aspect. And what are the implications with climate change what does that mean as a planner so and also just talk about how why Columbia, you know like how is Columbia really going to help you to get where you want to go in your career. So, I just want to say like you don't just try to give more about who you are as well. You know it's, it's not just academic I mean obviously academic is important but like you know there's other aspects to it. Great thanks to Kat. So, I think we have answered all the questions in the chat box right if you have any just type in I would like to ask all of the current students, whoever wants to chime in. I have a question that may help all of you to think about why you want to come to Columbia or why you want to study planning. That is, what's life like, especially now we finally our students are back on campus in Columbia and New York. Both in terms of academic life and just sort of campus life as a, you know, nobody sort of ask that question I'm sure it's on your mind, probably a question that you'll be interested more when you see after you are admitted but I think it's kind of a interesting to hear from our current students so whoever wants to take that up. I get to me in this way. So, so the last year I did the, the courses online and now I'm doing in campus and it's really changed because like now in terms of academics is very different to make a discussion over any topic like in person where you can feel the topic you can feel the debate all over the classroom. And also explain your points easier than in Zoom and less into the academic like we also have some gatherings every week and also we can we discuss a lot of challenges in your own planning but also we have like social events to have more relaxing time. Yeah. Yeah, I can also say a couple words I feel like there's no better place to study urban planning than in New York City. Everything you learn from the class the moment you walk out of the school, you walk off campus and there you see the problems how they're like you really see the issues and what we have accomplished so far. There's a lot of different subways, you know, environmental just environmental health justice, you know, justice, air quality, so everything else is like connected. It's very different. It's going to be very different if you're studying it like in a school that's in the suburb and you will still be studying, you know, New York based cases but it's just your, you won't be in New York City and see how, and it feel like how those experiences are really, like how they are really so like impacting people's life. So I, yeah, I'm writing a thesis on air quality and on open streets. So like I would bike just next to campus every day and it's very exciting like get to live and study the place and feel connected. I mean, an hour and a half went by pretty quickly. So I want to thank you all for tuning in and and also thank all of our current students, five of you and Emily to be here. And we look forward to receiving your applications and wish you the very best luck, wherever you are in getting ready to apply for graduate school. It's a big step, and you are already making the first, you know, stride in my big step. So, yep, feel free to reach out and Emily and I will stay on a little bit in case you want to ask another question or two, like more individually, and then for the rest of you. Enjoy the rest of the day or night and hope to connect in one way or another. Thank you, Wavy. Thank you all. Thank you to all the students for joining. Thank you. Good luck. You went. Thank you both that was that was really informative I feel like I was, I got so much more information out of that than I was expecting somehow just a lot about the culture of your program and how you're thinking about evaluating incoming students. So what I've been thinking about is I've been looking at various professors pages and like evaluating the work that they're doing and seeing what interests me and sort of imagining how I relate that and during this program. I know some programs have sort of encouraged people to reach out to professors who's interest them. I'm generally very nervous to do that. I'm just wondering how, like, as I'm really trying to get a feel for the culture of the place and specifically, you know, there's not too many people here so maybe I'll be more specific but I'm really, I really am looking for a program with a strong design ethos and design education component and seeing how that fits into the way that just sort of the core curriculum works. And are there people you would encourage us to reach out to to talk about how that those skills are developed in new students. Should we just reach out to professors. Yeah, this year it's been difficult because you can't sit in a class and just, you know, talk to what I used to, you know, host students in my class and they really get to connect. It's difficult to connect just by email right because you don't really get a sense of how say on design classes or even studio classes not being able to sit in. It's difficult so I would. So why don't you email Emily right so and if she connects you with the professor, the likelihood of, you know, real connection is much much higher. We really tried not to do a lot partially because at this stage, partially because there's just a lot of inquiries. And you, if you have interest way beyond what we have described in the booklet on the website, then that will be, you know, appropriate to connect. You know, certainly I think maybe Douglas Woodward, you know, some, some of the faculty who are more on the design side, one or two people who can try to help. Great. Thank you so much. I definitely will continue to look through those resources and then follow up as necessary, but I just really appreciate you taking time this evening and I hope you have a good night. Thank you. Thanks y'all I actually had a very similar question to the one that was previously asked, but just before dropping off. I'm particularly interested in understanding more about development and so I know there's that real estate masters but I'm in this space right now where I'm thinking about whether to pursue that or just kind of stick with the masters and urban planning. And I was just wondering if I could get connected with a student that had a background in both. It sounds like Emily you're the person to reach out to, to explore that and see if there's a current or alumni student to see what kind of experience they had and also you know, maybe I stick to the potentially the masters in urban planning but there's a possibility to take classes in other GSAP programs and maybe that's a possibility to explore but that was just some of the questions I had so. Yeah, so we actually have quite a bit planning students taking real estate courses. We need a dual degree really I mean I think the real degree of what it does is give you, especially in terms of the on the finance side more exposed, right. If you're interested in development and the process. We have, I would say maybe a quarter hour students take some real estate courses. Maybe two or three or four, because you know, you can count them towards your electives right any GSAP course counts towards our electives. Okay, the. We also even have a real estate and the finance course for planners. Right, so we make sure that is accessible to planning students so you don't even have to take real estate classes to have a little bit of real estate exposure. Yeah. No that's really helpful to understand and just kind of get a perspective from you directly so I appreciate that. Absolutely. We do have some students who start the dual degree after their first year and then they start in the summer after the first year planning so if you don't feel like you're getting enough access to courses or something you apply in the next year, and I would also add to what way pink said some of the real estate courses actually do count towards our economic and community development concentration. Yeah, and, and as we said you have a lot of opportunities to take electives, you have basically 33 required electives, and then with the tuition you pay you have another 12 points and electives that you can take so you really have a lot of room to take a lot of real estate courses if you got it. Yeah, and I did attend the real estate programs open house yesterday and they mentioned you know some students will start after they started their other program first so it makes a lot of sense there's just such a world of options and so many things to learn so it's it's helpful to get y'all take on that I appreciate it. Thanks for your time. The two, the way that the tuition works is, you can take up to 19 credits a semester, we only require 60. So, you know, 19 times four is 76 right so you can take another 16 credits worth of electives. If you can have a 19 a semester. Sure. And students really do that last year, with a pandemic, we allowed students up to 25 credits we actually have if you see that. Wow. Awesome. Well thanks again for the time. Look forward to completing my application. Great. Take care. Good luck. Thank you. Okay, I think we might be able to end here now yeah. Do you want to do you want me to remain on do you want to talk about I think we I think they might not be. Yeah, we can just end right. Okay, it was great. Lots of good questions. Yeah. Okay, see you in a couple of days. Yeah.