New Indigenous planning concentration to begin in 2012

New Indigenous planning concentration to begin in 2012

As of Fall 2012, SCARP will be offering a new concentration in Indigenous Planning (IP) within our Masters degree. For many reasons, ranging from the BC Treaty process to changes in federal attitudes concerning Aboriginal rights and title, First Nations have significant and growing demands for qualified planners to guide their revitalization and re-building efforts. Planning can be a means to empower Aboriginal (First Nations, Metis, and Inuit) communities, to avoid further exploitation and to gain practical and everyday control over their destiny.

Planning by and with First Nations requires specific skills and abilities, whether planners are indigenous or non-Native. Students need not only substantive knowledge of planning’s interdisciplinary components (legal, social, ecological, economic, etc) but also an understanding of the protocols, history, philosophy, social structure, traditional knowledge and ecology of First Nations, Inuit and Metis peoples. Cross-cultural skills, community participation techniques, and a solid grounding in ethics and decolonizing research methodologies and practices are essential.

The new IP concentration will consist of five core courses (covering law and governance; community economic development; cross-cultural skills; regional sustainability planning; and indigenous planning as an emerging paradigm) along with a one-year Practicum working with/in a First Nations community in BC. There will also be an optional Internship with a First Nation in the Lower Mainland.

This new concentration addresses not only planning issues internal to indigenous communities, but also the critical need to develop a basis for more functional communications and relationships with surrounding non-Aboriginal communities and municipalities, aiming to overcome the often very difficult histories of relations between these communities and defining a way for their collaboration and co-development to progress.

Up to five students will be admitted into the IP concentration in 2012, growing to ten by 2017.