Doctoral Program in City Planning

Welcome to our online source of information for the Doctoral Program in City and Regional Planning in the School of Design at the University of Pennsylvania. Here you will find information about our outstanding faculty, their research interests, teaching, and professional activities; the expectations and requirements of the Program; and profiles of our Ph.D. students and graduates.

The University of Pennsylvania is an intellectually stimulating environment in which to study the serious problems that face our metropolitan areas today and the broad spectrum of responses to meet those challenges. Students enrolled in the Ph.D. Program have easy access to a broad, multi-disciplinary faculty and all the resources of a first-rate urban research university.

The Ph.D. program in the Department of City and Regional Planning (CPLN) is one of the oldest in the country, dating back to the 1950s. Our respected faculty has guided almost several hundred students though their graduate studies to the completion of their dissertation, enabling our graduates to assume positions of leadership in both planning academia and the planning profession.

Students who matriculate in the doctoral program are governed by general University policies for the doctoral  degree,which are contained in such documents as those promulgated by the Graduate Council of Faculties (see University's Educational Policies and Publications for Graduate Students, especially the Academic Rules for Research Doctorate and Master’s Degrees section) and the Policies and Handbooks of the School of Design. We expect students to familiarize themselves with the policies very early in their academic careers.