ULI North Texas volunteers in the UrbanPlan facilitation session at University of Texas, Arlington MBA Real Estate class.

Objective: UrbanPlan at the university will create land use professionals–developers, planners, architects, investors, and policy makers–who are more sophisticated and effective when they enter the workforce.

The primary target is graduate students whose focus is land use: city and regional planning, MBA/real estate, and architecture. It can be effective in carefully selected fourth-year undergraduate classes. It is not designed for students whose professional focus does not relate to land use.

UrbanPlan moves students from a theoretical and ideological understanding of their discipline to the practical realities and demands of the development team and process.

For more details see Professor FAQ

The curriculum was developed for and is only supported in economics and selected government classes. The curriculum aligns with all state and national content standards for high school economics and provides a much-needed local government component to government classes.

For more details, see Teacher FAQ.

Student development teams respond to a “request for proposals” for the redevelopment of a blighted site in a hypothetical community. Each team member assumes one of five roles: finance director, marketing director, city liaison, neighborhood liaison, or site planner. Through these roles, students develop a visceral understanding of the various market and nonmarket forces and stakeholders in the development process. They must reconcile the often-competing agendas to create a well-designed, market-responsive, and sustainable project.

Teams address challenging financial, market, social, political, and design issues; develop a pro forma and three-dimensional model of their plan; and present their proposal to a “city council” of ULI members that awards the development contract to the winning team.

• As “Facilitators,” through Socratic interaction volunteers challenge the students to think more critically about the UrbanPlan issues and the specific responsibilities of their “role” (finance, market, site planner, city liaison, neighborhood liaison).
  
• As “Presenters,” UP volunteers engage in interactive discussions with students on the member’s own project work or specific professional challenges. Through thoughtful questioning, the presenter helps students relate these issues and decisions to struggles the students are experiencing in UrbanPlan.
  
• As “City Council,” UP volunteers hear student presentations, challenge their proposals as would happen in an actual city council hearing, and award the development contract to the winning development team.

• UP has reached 20,000 high school and university students since 2004.
  
• 18 ULI District Councils run UrbanPlan programs. See programs.
  
• More members (1500+), including trustees, governors, and product council members, participate in UP than in any other national or local ULI program.
  
• 148 high school classrooms are running UP in academic year 2009-10.
  
• 16 universities, primarily graduate level, are running UP in academic year 2009-2010.