Over my career at the UT I have taught many courses. On this page I provide information on several of them, including course syllabus and the weekly schedule of readings and in-class activities.

Some of these courses included research projects done either for a community partner (a nonprofit or City office) or to explore new topics that interested me. Oftentimes, these exploratory projects were the first step in a longer process of investigating and developing an idea and testing a set of solutions.

Class research projects for seminars were typically done in small groups and were one of several assignments for the course. Projects done as part of Capstone or Practicum courses were more ambitious and often resulted in a storymap and/or set of research products. On my research page I list the projects by course and provide a brief description of each. Full materials are posted for a selection of projects.

Courses offered that included research projects

Courses offered that included research projects

Affordable Housing Policy and Planning Seminar

Here is the most recent syllabus for my Affordable Housing Seminar, from Fall of 2025. And here is the schedule of readings.

Community Development Seminar

Here is the most recent syllabus for my Community Development Seminar, from Fall of 2025. And here is the schedule of readings.

Community Benefit Agreements (short course offered at McGill University, Montreal)

Here is a description of this short course offered while on leave in Spring of 2011.

Urban Politics Seminar

This course was offered occasionally and focused on a different topic each year. Here is the syllabus from the most recent offering.

Practicum: Creating Inclusive Corridors–Austin’s Airport Boulevard (2012)

Although this class was taught before we began requiring practicum courses, it followed a similar approach. Although the course was formally an elective course on affordable housing we carried out an ambitious class project focused on assessing strategies for integrating preservation of existing affordable rental housing into a major corridor that was the focus of a city planning initiative. The resulting project won an award from the local chapter of the American Planning Association.

Practicum: Urban Design strategies for improving quality of life for residents of Rundberg’s Brownie Lane (co-taught with Kristine Stiphany) (2013)

The Fall 2013 CRP practicum studied the Rundberg Lane Region of Austin, Texas, with particular focus on Brownie Drive. The primary objective of the course was to investigate how urban design might be used to transform the existing conditions of Brownie Drive into preferred ones. Relying on recommendations outlined in the Georgian Acres and North Lamar Combined community plans, the practicum focused on five primary issues: Lack of a sense of safety; Limited community places and spaces accessible to the elderly and the street’s many children and adolescents; Poor spatial definition between fourplexes and Brownie Drive; Physical isolation within and beyond the Brownie neighborhood; and, Inadequate infrastructure to manage water and runoff. The students began by documenting the social and physical characteristics and challenges of Brownie Drive. They next studied ideas and lessons from precedents in Austin and other cites. They then identified five themes that encompassed the challenges they identified and developed a set of 12 proposals for physical interventions that could be implemented incrementally.

[Rundberg review photo]

Practicum:

Building on the work done in the 2012 course focused on the Airport Boulevard Corridor, and in parallel to a research project on developing metrics cities could use to prioritize corridors for affordable housing preservation and development, in 2014-15 my practicum students focused on conditions in two Austin corridors: Burnet Road and East Riverside Dr. Over the course of two semesters, we studied conditions, tested metrics, and developed proposals for preserving access and improving conditions for existing renters.

Practicum:

Practicum:

Others courses offered

Other courses

History and Theory of Planning

Research Design

Qualitative Research Methods

Planning Theory (doctoral seminar)