- Planning Types
Planning Types
Focus Areas
-
A framework that helps you develop more effective planning processes.
- Challenges
Challenges
Discussions and resources around the unresolved pain points affecting planning in higher education—both emergent and ongoing.
Common Challenges
- Learning Resources
Learning Resources
Featured Formats
Popular Topics
- Conferences & Programs
Conferences & Programs
Upcoming Events
- Community
Community
The SCUP community opens a whole world of integrated planning resources, connections, and expertise.
Get Connected
Give Back
-
Access a world of integrated planning resources, connections, and expertise-become a member!
- Planning Types
Planning Types
Focus Areas
-
A framework that helps you develop more effective planning processes.
- Challenges
Challenges
Discussions and resources around the unresolved pain points affecting planning in higher education—both emergent and ongoing.
Common Challenges
- Learning Resources
Learning Resources
Featured Formats
Popular Topics
- Conferences & Programs
Conferences & Programs
Upcoming Events
- Community
Community
The SCUP community opens a whole world of integrated planning resources, connections, and expertise.
Get Connected
Give Back
-
Access a world of integrated planning resources, connections, and expertise-become a member!
Campus Planning
We know the higher education campus can be more. More than laboratories that accommodate research. More than classrooms that hold students. More than buildings that store books. The campus can be nurturing. It can be inviting. It can be stimulating. It can be the physical manifestation of an institution’s mission, a reminder of the promise and potential waiting to be unleashed.
It can be more . . . with campus planning.
What is campus planning?
Campus planning
glossary outlines the long-term direction of a higher education institution’s physical and built environment. It ensures the highest and best use of land to meet a college or university’s academic, research, and outreach missions.
While campus planning occurs every day as an ongoing process, longer-range recommendations are often documented in a report called a campus master plan
glossary or campus land use plan.
Campus planning covers:
- Open space
- Buildings
- Non-motorized circulation (walking paths, bike lanes, etc.)
- Motorized circulation (roads, public transportation access, etc.)
- Utilities
Depending on the institution, it will either cover, inform, or coordinate with these initiatives:
- Facilities
glossary (including architecture)
- Space management
- Utilities
- Sustainability
- Transportation
- Deferred maintenance
- Capital planning
glossary
Why do campus planning?
Colleges and universities are complex and constantly evolving their teaching, research, and community activities. This pressures campus systems to meet the needs of today with flexibility to address the unknown needs of the future. Without campus planning, development can occur haphazardly, resulting in a multitude of problems over time.
The campus plan should:
- Align to the institution’s academic and strategic goals
- Maximize use of critical resources
- Incorporate smart growth planning principles
- Enhance safety and wellness
Why is integrated planning important for campus planning?
The built environment is an important resource for carrying out the institution’s mission and recruiting students, faculty, and staff. Therefore, the campus master plan must align with the college’s or university’s strategic plan and academic plan. Creating and maintaining the physical environment requires a lot of resources itself, so integrated planning can prevent costly projects that don’t meet enrollment, learning, or research goals.
An integrated process builds consensus among each institution’s diverse stakeholders. This allows an institution to create a physical environment tailored to the institution’s mission, culture, and location.
Campus planning that is not integrated will not embrace the beauty of diversity, will conflict with and not complement supportive plans, and will fall short of providing the guidance required for institutional leadership to make sound decisions.
Who does campus planning?
Depending on the institution, campus planning will be led by external consultants or internal staff from the campus planning (or similar) department. Institutional employees are often organized into a steering committee and work groups that develop specific system recommendations (utilities, transportation, etc.).
The steering committee provides final guidance before recommendations are taken to institutional leadership for review and approval. Approval usually comes from the president or chancellor and governing board.
Campus planning requires multidisciplinary input from a broad spectrum of stakeholders, both internal (students, faculty, staff, etc.) and external (municipalities, neighbors, etc.). Who to involve will depend on institutional needs and project specifics. One key stakeholder is the host community, since campus systems extend beyond the campus boundary, integrating with neighboring communities (e.g., open space, roads, sidewalks, bicycle paths, utilities, and architectural patterns).
When is campus planning done?
A regularly updated plan provides institutional leadership with a valuable tool to make short- and long-range decisions regarding the built environment. While campus planning occurs on a daily basis, a comprehensive campus master plan
glossary should be created regularly—five- and 10-year cycles are common.
Institutions that wait for a triggering event, like a large capital outlay approval and building boom, will find themselves challenged by schedule pressures to deliver a truly integrated and comprehensive plan. It’s better if those triggering events can be aligned to or incorporated into the institution’s existing campus master plan.
How is campus planning done?
Every student, employee, alumnus, visitor, and neighbor has ideas to improve the physical campus. The process needs to be inclusive, integrated, and interactive.
The campus planning process includes:
- Identifying stakeholders
- Leveraging conversations with multiple stakeholders
- Building consensus through common understanding
- Balancing opportunities, constraints, and competing demands to identify the best use of campus resources
- Outlining a flexible framework for physical development
Author: Stephen Troost, Campus Planner, Michigan State University; SCUP Campus Planning Academy Member Learn how.
You’re invited to join the SCUP community toward learning and practicing integrated campus planning in higher education. Check out our related learning resources and upcoming events and courses below.
Interested in becoming a SCUP member? We have a place for you. Learn more and join us.
Join the conversation on the SCUP listserv.
Related Learning Resources
Planning for Higher Education Journal
Space Jam
Much of the conversation around the return to campus this fall has focused on academic courses. But other events and meetings will also need to be accommodated.Conference Recordings
The Process and Positive Outcomes of Indigenous Placemaking
Ryerson University's experience with indigenous placemaking offers valuable, practical insights into a process that can help your institution to respect and advance indigenous cultures while balancing many other contextual factors.Conference Recordings
Achieving a Sustainable Campus Master Plan through Integrative Design
This session will explore Princeton University’s campus master plan, which engages an ethos of sustainability through the lens of carbon emissions, landscape design, energy, and water efficiency, from design through construction.Planning for Higher Education Journal
‘Colorblind-Spots’ in Campus Design
Educational leaders are noting that conventional campus design planning efforts have neglected to include the voices of historically underserved communities. Socio-spatial inquiry can help institutions offer an equity approach to inclusivity and authentic engagement.Planning for Higher Education Journal
Space & Power in the Ivory Tower
The challenges of managing physical space in public higher education are often left unspoken and unexamined—this author researched the politics, culture, and process of space planning and management at three large public research institutions.Example Plans
2020–30 Campus Master Plan Update
The university’s master plan update, which addresses campus growth from a housing deficit to a more robust traffic prediction model.Conferences, Courses, and Workshops of Interest
Conference
Southern 2023 Regional Conference
October 1, 2023 - October 3, 2023
Houston, TXWhat's your biggest challenge?
Let us help you find the resources.
COVID-19 Response and PlanningDealing with Climate ChangeFunding UncertaintyPlanning AlignmentCompeting PrioritiesWhy I’m a SCUP Member...
"I am new to the world of planning and assessment, so joining SCUP and attending my first conference were invaluable in giving me insight into what others in the field are doing. I gained knowledge that I can implement immediately. Thanks, SCUP!"Jennifer MartucciSenior Manager, Institutional Planning & AssessmentAtlantic Cape Community College
Have content you’d like to share?Contact:Sadie WutkaDirector of Content Strategysadie.wutka@scup.org
734.669.3293