 Good morning, good day, good evening, wherever you are, I'm thrilled to see you even if it's on the screen. And I'm waving the director of the urban planning PhD program. And since you are on time, we'll start on time and it is being recorded. So I hope that's okay with all of you. And if you don't want to be, you know, on the recording, you can turn off your video. What I thought I would do today since, you know, I really only have an hour post also because of the time zone differences is getting to be midnight in many parts of the world from where you some of you are dialing in. So I want to focus more on your questions. I thought I would just share a very brief introduction of our program. And then another faculty colleague of mine will also likely be joining me to answer your question. So while you're listening or you already have some questions, so feel free to type in the chat box. We'll see our program manager will be collecting those and then addressing them to me quickly. So yeah, I see Hibba Hibba you want to introduce yourself really quickly. Hi, hello everyone. I'm Hibba I'm a professor in the urban planning program. Welcome everyone excited to see so many people from around the world. I'm Hibba Hipping and I are happy to answer any questions you have about our program. It's morning for us, but from wherever you're dialing in. So yeah. Thank you Hibba. And then Emily you want to also introduce quickly so that you know in case you get questions. Folks know who you are. Okay, Emily will be there in a minute. Excellent so let me then start with this very brief presentation. Really I want to focus focus quite a bit more on the unique opportunities in our program and how we work with doctoral students so you know if you have philosophical questions about what doctoral programs should do what people can do after doctoral program that this is probably not a place for that. You can, you know, have a conversation with your mentors, your also your professors on those questions. So, of course, you all have made up your mind or at least are thinking about coming to a PhD program. So why Columbia urban planning PhD right so that's really the key question. I really want to say that, similar to our master's program, our curriculum is dynamic and flexible so we do require students to take courses in the first two years, but we don't have a large number of required courses, so that our students can take advantages of the entire campus and really connecting knowledge across disciplines and we find that tremendously important for our students and we often tell our students. So you have five years of unfettered, you know, or up to time to explore about your intellectual worlds to decide what kind of scholars you want to become or what kind of policy practitioners or researchers you want to become and it's really to go beyond the regular bounds and to really explore deeply about your intellectual interests. So that's one thing that I think makes us very unique and very very sort of to us a great opportunity. Second, we do very much center, center social ratio and climate justice in build environment so the relationship to the built environment is important. We have a relatively moderate size of full time faculty. So we're not able to cover every single aspects of planning or urban inquiries. And so we really focus on a number of aspects which I will just spend a minute to elaborate a little bit. And then we have a very strong competitive perspectives through faculty and courses, bridging global north and global south. We do have faculty with regional expertise, and that is a big plus. And so, however, we really emphasize, you know, understanding global south and theories based off of global south, and in the way connecting to the issues that are presenting to, you know, across different countries, you know, and we also have really in the recent years built critical strength in urban science and analytics, not in a way of pure technological or quantitative or putting co scientific expertise but really from a very critical vantage point to examine using those tools to determine important planning and urban issues. So notice I do focus. And in my, you know, kind of presentation, not just planning but also urban in our master's degree we very much focus on planning. There's a lot of courses on urban issues and we do so even more in the PhD program. And we are very much preparing our students for not just being ready for academia, but also other kinds of research and professional careers. And so, and you can quickly see that our program has been along in history since 1953 for the master's program and 1935 for the master's program. And the dynamic and the flexible curriculum. And you can see here that the required first two years, the courses are essentially six courses and three of which are colloquium, and then one in advanced planning theory, another planning history so I won't read them you can see and this recording will be posted on the website if you want to see details of this presentation, you can certainly spend a little more time after today, we should be able to post it towards end of the next week, probably. And then we would like our students to be really home their research methods or methodological approaches and so you're going to take other courses. The courses to the to an area of specialty that you hope to focus on. And that area of specialty also becomes the exam area for your comprehensive exam. And then for those of you who are coming from a non planning background or even if you're coming from a planning program but in a very different context we highly encourage students to take our history and theory of planning course in the master's course or because we approach that in a very global close colonial way and very unique among many planning programs. And then our geographical information systems required course for master students is also very unique not just you know clicking through to know how to use to produce maps but really is a critical examination of how we use spatial tools to understand urban and planning issues. And so opportunities across Columbia as can see so this is just a, you know, of course includes all of the schools at Columbia but the various programs I include here. And programs from which our doctoral students have taken classes in, and you can see the range of opportunities and if not all but most of these programs have doctoral students of their own. So it's also building peer groups, building communities of scholars by taking these courses. So to say, you know, about the, the importance, the critical positioning of racial, social, and climate justice in our curriculum I just, this is the list of courses that we have for our master's students, and all pictures things are welcome for these. Some PhD students take here and there one or two but some take quite a few, and these are completely open some are more introductory for master's students but others are quite critical and in depth, or technical, technically comprehensive. So we have courses in the bill environment direction, and then community and economic development direction, we also have a set of courses, all of these courses are offered at least once every two years most of courses are offered every year. So you can plan when you get in. And then this comparative perspectives bridging global north and global south is also growing that in terms of our course offerings, and this is just in the planning program. This does not include courses in SIPA School of International Public Affairs which is very strong international front. Also, we have political science and sociology for instance in arts and sciences that our students get to take, and then the committee on global thought. And then the critical strength in urban science and analytics, it's also growing and there's a new degree happening at GSAP on more computational design practices that will start next year. So we're hoping that this is going to become a quite a critical cluster within GSAP and then of course there is the Data Science Institute at Columbia. So the readiness for academic research and professional careers comes through in a number of ways. Of course, the beauty of coming to a doctoral program is the one-on-one relationship that each student builds with their faculty, right, not only their advisor, but also other faculty in the program or even sometimes beyond the program. In addition to those, we have a number of ways of supporting and resources for students, and so you can take a look really quick. The one that we are very proud of is the financial support we offer to our students. So as long as you are admitted, a student is admitted, and then that student is entitled to at least five years' post of scholarship, which includes tuition and a stipend, as well as annual summer stipend, which is on top of the regular stipend. And then so each student in their second to fourth year will perform either as a teaching fellow, usually they are teaching fellows to support core courses for the master's program like planning history, methods, and economics, and planning law, and studios. And occasionally there will also be opportunity for a student to become a research fellow to work with an individual faculty. And then so that means the first and fifth year there is no responsibility required of the doctoral student to perform any of these support role for the master's program. And we felt like the second to fourth year fellowship is important for students also to build up a teaching portfolio if they're going into academia, or a research portfolio in terms of publication collaboration, and then these other kinds of opportunities are out there. And so our doctoral students, for instance, are really instrumental in putting together and connecting with scholars across the world in being the sort of the main organizers of our weekly lecture series. And so that's in the second year of doctoral studies. Now to the nitty gritty in terms of your application and the review of your application. Just keep in mind that we have pushed forward the application deadline to December 16 of this year. And it's really important that your application is on time. Because we will start reviewing shortly after, you know, the holidays, and all details about the application and the process you can find through the link from GSAP actually goes to the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, because even though this is a GSAP program, the administration in terms of awarding the diploma and degree is through Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. And just want to share with you a little bit of thoughts on the application, right. Some institutions require a doctoral applicant to have a proposal for the research that they intend to do well in the doctoral program. We approach this in somewhat different way. We really feel that, you know, the intellectual exploration and understanding of your own strength and development potentials is really important once you come in to the program. So we really don't ask for that. We ask for sort of, you know, to see some evidence from you on the way of thinking that you use to approach different challenges or issues on the ground or theoretically, conceptually, however you want to couch it. And then you show us that you can carry out independent research, and the evidence can be multiple different types, and then your writing ability is really, really important. And so a writing sample or two is very useful. I would discourage a very long writing sample so we would not have the time to really read like an entire thesis, but maybe a chapter would be good. Any publications you've had, a term paper you've done, would all be an excellent, you know, type of writing sample. So the personal statement for us is an important space for us to look. It's that we want to see your academic preparation but not just that we're not interested like which high school which college. I mean that's, that's all going to be on your transcript. But how you prepare yourself for the doctoral program is what we're looking for in terms of academic preparation. You are interested in one or two areas of urban studies or planning. Tell us why are you interested. Tell us how you see about that topical areas. Tell us your understanding of the major theories and arguments and debates around those topics. And where do you stand. It's okay and you stand across from some major theorists, but we want to see how you reasoned and how you approach a important issue in the field or even neighboring fields. Today if you come from landscape, that's fine right landscape architecture, but your interest must be somewhat related to urban and planning and tell us how you see that linkage and connection. And we also would like to see in your personal statement, your experience with analytical reasoning could be quantitative could be spatial could be qualitative. And last in terms of the review process that we review as a faculty collectively. So we do not match advisors at the reviews us stage certainly, maybe not even in the first year of a doctoral program we would like the students to explore. As long as we have capacity to direct a student in terms of topical interest, we are fine with, you know, admitting a student. So then we'll have will host a group discussion with a much smaller number of finalists and this will probably happen in early February or so. So we'll be in touch to with those of students who we would like to invite for that. And then we hope to send out admission or waitlist decisions in March, but some decisions may come a little bit later but certainly the more positive decisions will come earlier. So last would be I would encourage you to explore and discover by going to our website we have past dissertations of our students all you know you can see their full dissertations, you can see our alumni placement on our website. And if you have questions be given that we do have a lot of interest both in the PhD program as well as in the master's program. We cannot guarantee that we can answer to your inquiry fully each time. And so be prudent in reaching out and do your homework and really kind of discover what we already have posted on the website so with that. Let me stop this part and we already have questions so hit button I would then start answering these questions you can also raise your hands. If you want if you want we think you want to start with the questions in the chat I can take some of those. Yeah, absolutely yeah let's do that. Okay, so I'm just going to go off some questions of the on the chat so the first set of questions is about the over over all tuition and it's already said that we cover. We cover all the PhD students we admit we do admit only three students a year so that is unless there is some circumstances going on that's the limit upper limit for our for the number of students admit a year. We have like between 1900 applications and so we select three so you want us, it's about 3% selection rate total years of the program it's going to depend on you some people finish in four years some people finish in six years we try not to hold people here a long time here so you don't like sit here for eight years and they're like oh what did I do eight years of PhD now like what I'm going to go next so. But yeah so this is advice with the student advice with the topic. You can always of course get external funding and people do get that depending on the topic you have. I mean I suggest because we have short time and there's many of you to keep space for more. There's a lot of information you can find online if there's specific question about specific course you can raise it later. Just general questions about the courses that is a big question and it's also depends on the what kind of course what what is the question is asking about so feel free to be more particular if you want to raise it again. In terms of the questions. Does the content of writing sample have to be related to potential PhD research interest topics. It doesn't have to be. I think it just show us that you can make an argument it's solid it's well written it's solid it's making an argument. It doesn't have to be like you you you. It doesn't have to be like oh you've studied this before so you can study it at the PC. So I don't, you can you can do that you can submit samples that are not necessarily what you're planning to study. Like we've been said, we appreciate proposals that show that you've done your homework. So this is, I just want to reiterate this so PhD proposals are very different or statements are different than masters and masters you can get away by saying, oh I'm interested in this I grew up in this city, I like this, my neighbor is that you know, that's, but for PhD you have to like demonstrate a little bit of knowledge about the knowledge about the topic you're interested in and show us why you're interested in again like we read a lot of these so you want your proposal to stand out by demonstrating solid knowledge and an exciting opportunity for for for research and to open up new research topics and also the thing I say to my students who are thinking of applying for PhD. When we accept people we are also learning so we're also excited about the students we accept so you're coming to learn we're also learning from you so it's so we're very much invested because with a small program we're very much invested in the learning environment we create. We're not excited people who are excited also to be here and proposing exciting things to study that are that resonate with this with the fields with the fields that we've been already outlined that we are, we have expertise in. In terms of saying my research interests are related to climate change adaptation that I have to submit the writing sample again you don't have to. Let me so i'm reading through questions. That specific so if you want to know about the courses I have posted in my presentation you go to the master programs website. So Emily can share that with you in the chat box, there is a booklet there for all, all of the courses have a description in that booklet so again. Our PhD program and doctor and master program are really kind of staffed by the same set of faculty so you will find there. In terms of whether or not you want to include a ready sample that must be related to your proposed topic. Not really. I mean, as I mentioned, your intellectual interest will evolve. We use writing sample primarily to see how you reason how you conduct critical analysis how you write how you organize your thoughts. So the writing sample is for the writing. It's called writing sample right. That's what we look for. Yeah, so him. Yeah I mean, there are a lot of questions so in our personal statement we should avoid being explicit on which advisor would like to work no you don't you don't have to avoid just just be yourself but we're just saying that we do not assign people we give you the liberty. To kind of if you want to do typologies there are two kind of PhD programs when you come in urban planning there's people who assign you an advisor when you immediate when you join, and there are programs who don't. We are the we are the kind of program that doesn't assign you an advisor when you join and then you can figure it out by the second 30 we're all working with you in different colloquium colloquium stuff until you get to that point. So that that is the kind of program we have but you can say I'm interested in this advisor that advisor that actually helps sometimes to figure out your interest but yeah so no just just go with what you feel like you want to say in that statement don't like censor yourself. The advisor are the only ones in the PhD web page or can we pick someone from SIPA for example I will, I will leave this to a pink to. It is quite possible to have a committee member from SIPA any school in Columbia actually to be a sponsor, meaning the real advisor, you really need to have it from the within. Basically, really more within the urban planning program that are occasional cases where if it's really important for someone to have an outside sponsor. The situation is going to be like co sponsoring so there's an internal member and then there's the outside of GSAP but still within Columbia, you can, they can be co sponsors for dissertation, particularly on the topic that maybe the planning faculty isn't quite in that area of expertise. Let me also just address some more logistical issues that if you have undergraduate or graduate degree from an English speaking institution, I believe you can waive TOEFL you'd really need to read the GSAS application requirements more carefully. If you have any questions you can address to them directly or you can address to GSAP admission so Emily can you type in the GSAP admission email so that folks can email them directly. In terms of visa process and all of that, we have absolutely no control, and we really try to get the mission letters out, you know, by March and, you know, obviously everybody by law, not my law by general practice have until April 15 store accept. And so from then to September is five months, not quite four months should be fine for visa process but we have absolutely no control over that. Yeah. Yeah. So, and I want to answer the question and I think maybe my whipping and I will will answer it differently about contacting the professor before, before, before applying I get I get a lot of emails. And if you, my, my take on this is that you have to see that kind of the number of emails we get every day and so I would only contact in general, just as an advice if you if you really related your field is really related to that person and if you've done your job, but like, generally emails like I'm interested in like transportation I personally don't do anything related to transportation can you zoom with me that's not like, gonna, that's not going to work out you know so only if you're really, if there's you can, like, beneficial to you from that conversation, specifically that professor can help with something. And also, it's very difficult to the request to read proposals is not is not going to work because we cannot like, we cannot read for one person and not the other that will be a little bit of preferential treatment. And so I cannot say yes to one person and say I can't read to the other and we have limited times. So, personally I cannot read proposals. Sometimes if someone is asking something related to my research, I can answer that that at least my my take on this. I don't know way thing maybe have actually I have the same take completely we get. I mean, I don't know how many emails right. And I always try to encourage my own students who want to apply for PhD students, you know, that first email is so important whether you know someone will answer or not. It all has to do with how what you do with that email. You're asking for a meeting that is a lot to ask, right, you know, our students. But if you send a writing sample and the writing sample really speaks to your interest you've done your homework you know what we do. You know what the faculty does, you have a burning intellectual question. That's a little bit of a first in different first email of a kind right and you'll, it's the same thing when you apply for jobs, it's really the same. It really is. Unfortunately, we can't possibly answer all the emails. I try as director at least I sort of encourage students to, you know, provide whatever evidence to strengthen your application. But really I cannot sort of guarantee any subsequent responses on your personal part. So I always ask, you know, if you're truly interested in this area which seems to relevant send me a writing sample I'll take a look at the right. And I think sometimes that's because there's a misconception that you need to like, you need to get the attention of some professor in the pro in the program so that you can like have high chances to be admitted to be admitted and I speaking from experience both as a student who was on the admissions committee for three years at Berkeley and then now as a faculty at Columbia that's not the case it's usually really the statements and the CVs and the letters that push themselves to the front rather than who spoke to who. So, that's a really good point Hibah really you know we've admitted in fact most of the students we've met it in the last few years, we have we had no clue, you know who they are we had no initial contact, but they're writing. They are thoughtful kind of statements the recommendation letters I can't tell you how important those are those letters need to be so speaking to your critical thinking to your research abilities with details not just you know kind of a lot of information but no details. I mean, I can tell you most good recommendation letters for doctoral application should be at least one page single space completely full, possibly two pages possibly three pages I mean, really speaking to what your interests are really speaking to how good you are in doing this and that, or even pointing to maybe some challenges you have that we can help you know what you, I mean, of course if you're a great scholar you don't. So everybody has room to grow and we'd like to see how we can support that. And so I can't tell you how important those three letters and the more letters you get probably the better but they really should be at least two letters should be from an academic background to speak to intellectual growth. And let me also tell you really quickly and help us absolutely right matter doesn't matter whether we know you are not know you your application has to arrive has to rise to the top. So we, so generally we read everybody's that we then come to a shorter list, then we come to a even shorter list, then we talk to that shorter, the second time the shorter list, and then we go from there, even a shorter list. Sometimes it's not because your application is not strong, and sometimes it's because we don't have the faculty to really support you, we want to be responsible. Also, yeah, so I think we should take some questions who have been patiently raising your hands. So, Tiffany, and then Amanda. Thank you, weeping. Thank you, but for. Can I can can you both hear me. Okay, great. Yeah, thank you for hosting this and info session for us. I have two questions actually the first one is regarding the TA or are a requirements teaching assistant or the researchers to fellowship requirements do you have a minimum or maximum number of semesters for those. And then the second question is, I heard that you are currently interviewing for maybe three new hires in the department, which sounds exciting and I was just wondering when we might hear more about that. Yeah, that's it. Thank you. Okay, that's why I have to end this right before 12 o'clock. Anyway, yes. So, second to fourth year, quite likely most students will need to do all six semesters as teaching fellows because it's really critical that we, our master's students are supported. So, it's also really important for a doctor student to build a teaching portfolio because they actually each needs to hold like a lab session or disk lead discussion groups and so really responsibilities that prepare the student to become faculty right down the road. If your career goal may not be to become a professor. We really think that the cross training in different aspects of planning is important and for instance we might just ask the student to do more the studio which is more practice oriented teaching. It's also possible a teaching fellow may be actually becoming a mentor, sort of more on an individual basis to master students so we do have one or two every year of doctor students doing that. And when the research fellowship is likely that's usually when we, our needs for the supporting master students are met. We do have more doctoral students then, especially project needs of one or two faculty members, then it could be a good match. Then we do that. So it's pretty kind of integrated with the master's program, shall I say I want to be completely honest with you right so because we do have students who want to do field work in their fourth year, we absolutely give a flexibility so that they can complete the fellowship maybe in their fifth year, right so that they can go do field work and then come back when they write and they do the fellowship. In terms of the faculty search, yes, we are full force on that we really very much are aware of the importance of supporting doctoral students with that will be a senior faculty at least one. And we will know by next spring who will be joining us and they will be joining us in the fall so for any new students coming in. Next fall, and you will know what faculty will be studying with Amanda. Hi. Thanks so much for this session I have a question and it's a little bit of a concern around the three person cohorts, beyond just the application. I'd love to hear a little bit about the culture and sort of the social culture and the culture around working together. Three is a small number and I'm at the urban planning program at Berkeley. Now and there's quite a few more than just three and so the collaboration seems to be really important. What are ways that you can collaborate across different departments. And with master students which I think way paying you are just speaking to. Yeah, maybe you can answer because he was also went to Berkeley. I did my PhD at Berkeley and I teach here. I've never seen such a tight knit community as the one here, frankly, it's amazing I Berkeley we will it was I love Berkeley to so I'm not, I'm not, I'm not saying anything not not great but we were like three. We're still segregated into groups of three depending on your interest, but here because the way we select students. They're usually people who can speak to each other intellectually and stuff so it's very not tight knit we have a PhD room. Everyone is there all the time they eat together I mean covert has changed a little bit but like there's always meals together events together it's a very supportive environment people sharing all the time like their teaching notes their courses they. There's always like picnics and stuff so and then we're also there isn't some kind of we try to remove a little bit the hierarchy will also very collegiate with our PhD students so we have a very. We just had a PhD dinner on Tuesday with our PhD students, and it's just like a fun environment and so I actually that's, although it sounds small but because it's small. There's a lot of relationships across across incoming classes like so they're friends across the different graduation glasses. Yeah, so Amanda I'm fully aware of that when I went to PhD at Rutgers, my cohort had two people. So it was very tough. And so we are kind of aware of that. So in addition to what he was saying, you know, then you know when you are TA, say planning methods of planning series so right now in the planning series they have first year and I'm sorry second year and third year students are working together that really kind of binds them together because they actually as the instructional team they actually have to be talking to each other quite a bit understanding how to teach how to even assess learning outcomes so that and then quite interestingly, you know we have quite a bit students working together on publications right you know now I know to 30 years students are doing together one fourth year students just published article she just sent it to me, in terms of collaboration with the edge on faculty right so the key of the smaller committees is you actually do know each other quite well and there isn't the so I don't know how big. I'm not clear about all of the bigger programs how they found their students. One nice thing here is there isn't that sort of quitting cool competition for funding right everybody's fun exactly the same way for five years. They even playing field right, and so they removes that kind of sense of, you know, juggling that some students in some programs you have to do. Yeah. Maybe we can combine the two questions. One is about whether working professionals can be in the PhD program and another is about for someone coming out of working in the past few years, are there any kind of prerequisites that they need to fulfill. That's a really good set of questions so we welcome students I noticed also some questions about if you are from a policy background with that be okay, we welcome students from all sorts of background right and and and they do come from also to background. You must have a master's degree, however, before you can enroll. And many of our doctoral students have had work experience and that's actually an asset, not a distraction at all because planning is very much of, you know, professional field putting cool and when you graduate and you go out to become a faculty you most likely will be teaching master's students and they are graduating to become practitioners. And so the understanding and familiarity with challenges in the planning practice can be really, really useful as you begin to explore what top topics you want to, you know, put a few years on to do your dissertation or just to become a scholar of such that is very anchored in that connection between theory and practice. Okay. Ah, well so so I guess this question about choosing between teaching and research. So when I say, well, of course, most faculty, especially if you are teaching in four year university or with graduate programs you faculty all need to be teaching and research at the same time. Of course, there is a really nice and interesting and important career path as to become researchers right so say to think tanks international organizations. Now even NGO large NGOs that have research functions. The research kind of ability that you need to home for those places or in that career is very, very similar to a faculty who are teaching in graduate programs. The teaching part of course is a little bit different so we do have students currently with interest in that direction, and we are mindful of that. But if you talk to any of them, they will tell you teaching master's students is a real good preparation for research because the students can challenge your thinking on the, and sometimes, you know, can be quite a sort of jumping ground for your thinking and doing research. I have a question that says if you don't if I don't have any publication does it mean that I won't have any chances to be admitted. Just a clarification when we're talking about the writing sampling we don't necessarily write talking about a publication like something that got published in a book. It can be something that you wrote for class if you're applying directly from undergrad, as long as I'm not undergrad, the cat. That's something if you're applying as from masters, it can be a paper that you wrote for as long as it's polished so it doesn't have to be like out in a journal. But of course if it's out in June it's great submit that but if it's not, don't let that stop you from applying. Do we so Emily did we answer most all the questions in the chat box. Yes, there's just one new one about between the focus on socio economic processes for spatial analysis and urban design could you describe where Columbia stands or whether you have a more hybrid approach. Yeah, I think for planning in general is more on the social economic analysis side. Urban design. Yes, you can occasionally see students in our program we because in G stop there is separate program on urban design it's more sort of integrated with architecture. We actually don't have faculty right now who at least in a full time basis, who are very very strong in urban design. So this is not a place I think where you would really pursue more of a design oriented doctorate. Yes, if you are doing let's say analytics with design so let's say street networks or even design sort of algorithms right that's a little bit different so we had a colleague who had a very strong design background, a lot of mobility research using that design background that's different right. And this question. What kind of comparative study is a school focused on are we talking about how the global south can learn from North urban planning experience. Other way around once you get into the program you will start honing that question we don't do that sort of kind of large scale ambitious kind well for students it's very challenging. Generally, let me give you an example, right. We just have a recent graduate who was looking at land governance issues right so land use regimes in different places. And one of the students looked at a city in Latin America, a city in the Middle East, I forgot have a dish you look at another, I thought it was three cities. Yeah, to in Mexico, and one in the middle one in Syria. So, it's not about, you know, how who can learn from it's looking at for in a sort of important conceptual that the how land regime is governed right. It's a very similar question across three different places. And to discover, you know, on the ground, how practices of planning actually converge or diverge on that question. I think the more a PhD research question is less about, okay, what we can do on, you know, in a different city based on a city as experience that's what we call, you know, what we called a crystal ball, we don't have a crystal ball. A dissertation research is more propositional. That is, you construct a set of reasoning based on evidence of different kinds to answer a conceptual or what we call empirical question. And so it's not about really just sort of crystal ball projecting plus for sure we're not we're not like selling global knows what to do a global south what to do from the global knows that's that's definitely something we're not doing. Yeah, we have maybe five minutes if there are other questions I think we did this pretty well in terms of time. We're going to have, what are some examples across disciplinary or PhD students have pursued during their studies. Yeah, that's a good question. In terms of action. So I know one of our recent grad who's now teaching in California, she did some work with anthropology doctor students, you know they were friends but they were colleagues because her approach to film work she looked at public housing in New York, so it was a very sort of ethnographical approach. And so she was in kind of a dissertation writing group with at least one maybe two anthropology PhD students, whom she met actually through classes that were together so I mean PhD program is really a quite a bit about self exploratory self discovery, and you go out that and, and find your peers of course the students in our program are, you know, very supportive peers each other, but they all have peers on campus that are beyond the program. And also like guy for example, who's a very strong theoretical like planning theory person who ended up strengthening her work in like coding and now she does like use use coding and using like use very, very sophisticated like coding and GIS kind of research design to explore the research questions and then reflect on them theoretically to so you have people who are really like mixing methods and research mixing anthropology, political science and urban planning so you have people crisscrossing, because I mean you have four courses or four courses you have to take here and then the rest is that you can take around campus and meet all sorts of people and this is what people do. And actually, since, since I mentioned that she just sent me her publication like essentially just came out today, you can take a look, you know she has a publication now in urban studies using Yeah. Um, if you have a question, you should ask now I'm, we probably won't have another meeting session or open house. From the faculty perspective, why did you choose the planning department at Columbia. Ah, I think someone, Lincoln, you had your hand up. Thank you so much. And that was my question about wondering about why you chose Columbia as a faculty member to come. Thank you so much. Um, well I can really quickly I've taught in two other universities for, you know, more than 15 years, I think Columbia strengths are, I'd say, what really attracted me to things. It's global outlook. And the second, it's interdisciplinary. We don't just say we really do it. That it's not as kind of a typical planning programs that very go into very technical, go into kind of narrow range of expertise, we really are interested in big questions, we're interested in questions that really speak to what's at stake for cities or planning myself more for cities. Yeah. Yeah, same for me, a global outlook interdisciplinary and I'm also some of them. Most fascinating brains for me, like, not not only in a G sub and campus are here and just to be the opportunity to be here and having this opportunity to be always having these conversations with them is great and because it is in some ways a compact campus, you have these encounters with people and we're all serve on committees outside G sub so we're always encountering people that you previously I've read in books or something so I really appreciate that intellectual stimulating conversation. And for me, I work on international context on New York, and it's global outlook is pretty, pretty exciting. So we have one last question, all of our rata positions are only available to matriculated students so we also have those for master's students. Unfortunately, you know that whatever positions and opportunities have we really try to see as a way of supporting our students. So thank you all very much. Really enjoyed meeting you all even though it's virtually I wish you the very best in your application and we certainly look forward to reading your applications, and even if you can't join us. I wish you all the best in your next pursuit of your doctor studies or career wise. So, again, thanks. Thank you everyone. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.