Course Library
Browse our library of planning courses
Effective City Branding
City branding strategy can capture and promote the unique characteristics of cities. After understanding the all-encompassing effort it takes to plan a city rebranding, this course teaches how cities can succeed using strong place branding that attracts visitors, new citizens, new industries, and new businesses.
Hand Drawing Master Plans
This course provides an introduction to urban design sketching by teaching how to draw urban design sketches and master plans using a mix of colored and black ink. These drawing techniques can be used to create plans that are detailed and expressive enough to use both in academic and professional presentations.
Working From Home for Planners
The future of work and the future of education are location independent, and we’re all better off because of it. This course focuses on general remote work tips and three remote work topics at the forefront of urban planners' minds as working from home becomes a new normal in the field of urban planning: productivity, teamwork, and public meetings.
Make No Little Plans: Daniel Burnham and the American City
The life and achievements of architect and urban designer Daniel Burnham offer a chance to witness the application of the social agenda of the City Beautiful movement, of which Burnham was one of the most famous practitioners.
Transportation Planning: Travel Behavior Regulations, Pricing, and Programs
This course reviews the efficacy of regulatory strategies (such as prohibitions and mandates), pricing strategies (such as peak period pricing), and education and information strategies (such as real-time ride-hailing apps).
Virtual Reality for Planners 2: Modeling in SketchUp
This course provides a step-by-step SketchUp tutorial and teaches users how to create content appropriate for a virtual reality environment. Viewers will learn how to optimize the performance of their software and ensure success in the next steps of the process, including final model export to Unity.
Virtual Reality for Planners 1: Introduction
Virtual reality presents urban planners with a unique tool to create immersive virtual experiences that can inform visioning processes, design decision-making, and community engagement. Learn about the evolution of virtual reality technology, its key vocabulary and logistics, the benefits of virtual reality over traditional media, and what the future of public engagement may hold.
21st Century Storytelling: Video for Planners
This course will give you motivation to create video content, and give you practical, affordable tips to be heard among the online noise.
Storytelling for Planners
This course will teach planners how to adapt proven storytelling methods employed by creative artists for centuries. We will cover the storytelling applications to analog and digital outreach methods.
Conceptual Drawing for Planners
In this course, we will learn effective ways of drawing as a means to communicate design ideas and explore digital tools that support traditional drawing.
Mobile Drawing Apps for Planners
This course explores three affordable mobile drawing apps and how each might facilitate the planner’s creative process.
Writing Master Plans, From Start to Finish
In this course you’ll learn how to approach a master plan—starting with concept development and community voice, and finishing with the mechanics of organizing and expressing ideas.
Mastering Mailchimp
In this course, we will review the Mailchimp email-publishing platform and create a simple, engaging e-newsletter.
Writing a Press Release
At the end of this course, you will feel confident in establishing your audiences and crafting language that provides the most impact in your press releases.
Digital Publishing for Planners
This course identifies popular digital publishing methods, and explains tradeoffs between user-friendly self-publishing tools and premium hosting services.
Leadership in Planning: Strategic Decision-Making in the Public Interest
At the end of this course, you will understand how to turn planning theory into practice in the real world.
External Relations for Planners
This course teaches customer service concepts, skills, and strategies to reflect well on planning organizations, and also make planners more effective in their work.
Managing a Planning Organization
At the end of this course, you will understand how to motivate and inspire staff; what steps to take to deal with unmotivated personnel; and how to manage an office as part of a larger organization.
Blogging About Planning
In this course we will review how blogs are used as planning tools to educate and engage participants in community decisions.
MetroQuest Public Involvement Software: In Practice and In Action
This course provides an introduction to working with MetroQuest, what it helps planners achieve, and some of its most important features and capabilities. The course also presents a series of case studies to demonstrate the results MetroQuest has achieved for a wide range of planning projects.