Most recent opportunities: (click to expand)
Graduate Teaching Assistant opportunities
Current openings still actively seeking applicants:
- GTA 2025WT2, PLAN 425
See below for details and to apply.
Please also note:
- GTA positions are subject to availability/allocation of budget and as such hours may change.
- It is each applicant's responsibility to confirm before applying that they meet all eligibility and qualifications, and that their own timetable is compatible with the demands of the position.
When you apply, you will also include:
- introductory brief (300 words)
- a current curriculum vitae (CV) highlighting your academic and employment experience
- teaching evaluations (if available)
- your current course/timetable
Click each course for details or to apply
Postings for during 2025 Winter Term 2 (Jan-Apr)
PLAN 321: Indigeneity and the City, BARUDIN
| Term | 2025WT2 |
| Instructor/Supervisor | Barudin, Jessica |
| Scheduled | Tu/Th, 11:00-12:30 |
| Total estimated hours | 192 hours/position |
| Application closing date | If re-appointment: Wednesday, April 30, 2025 |
| If new appointment: Sunday, June 1, 2025 |
Course description
Place-based exploration of the multiple, complex and contested ways urban Indigeneity is constituted in Canada today, with opportunities for field trips and hands-on learning.
PLAN 341: Smart Cities: Concepts, Methods and Design, TRAN
| Term | 2025WT2 |
| Instructor/Supervisor | Tran, Martino |
| Scheduled | Tu/Th, 12:30-2:00 |
| Total estimated hours | 192 hours/position |
| Application closing date | If re-appointment: Wednesday, April 30, 2025 |
| If new appointment: Sunday, June 1, 2025 |
Course description
The objective of this course is to understand the technological, social, ethical and policy challenges and opportunities for Smart Cities. This begins with a high-level overview of assessing key challenges that cities face including urbanization, social well-being, inequality, economic development and climate change; and through global case-studies and tutorials the course details key concepts, tools and frameworks to assess smart cities including: urban metrics and indicators, big-data analytics, data ethics and risk, and applications in urban modelling and simulation. Specifically, there is a focus on how data-driven analytics, and technological and social innovation can help address urban policy challenges and inform decision-making.
PLAN 425: Urban Plan Concepts, STEVENS
| Term | 2025WT2 |
| Instructor/Supervisor | Stevens, Mark |
| Scheduled | Fr, 8:00-11:00 |
| Total estimated hours | 153 hours/position |
| Application closing date | If re-appointment: Wednesday, April 30, 2025 |
| If new appointment: Sunday, June 1, 2025 |
Course description
This course provides an overview of the theoretical perspectives and development of urban planning, highlighting contemporary planning issues and the translation of knowledge in policy and practice, towards the aim of fostering thriving communities and more just cities. For third- and fourth-year undergraduate students interested in urban planning.
PLAN 448C: Planning Cities for Climate Change, CAGGIANO
| Term | 2025WT2 |
| Instructor/Supervisor | Caggiano, Holly |
| Scheduled | Tu, 11:00-2:00 |
| Total estimated hours | 192 hours/position |
| Application closing date | If re-appointment: Wednesday, April 30, 2025 |
| If new appointment: Sunday, June 1, 2025 |
Course description
Critical understandings of the current housing crisis, as well as progressive policy tools and community development strategies in pursuit of housing justice.
PLAN 448D: Indigenous Health/Wellness Planning/Community Development, BARUDIN
| Term | 2025WT2 |
| Instructor/Supervisor | Barudin, Jessica |
| Scheduled | Mo, 2:00-5:00 |
| Total estimated hours | 192 hours/position |
| Application closing date | If re-appointment: Wednesday, April 30, 2025 |
| If new appointment: Sunday, June 1, 2025 |
Course description
Critical understandings of the current housing crisis, as well as progressive policy tools and community development strategies in pursuit of housing justice.
PLAN 448E: Housing justice, KAMIZAKI
| Term | 2025WT2 |
| Instructor/Supervisor | Kamizaki, Kuni |
| Scheduled | Fr, 11:00-2:00 |
| Total estimated hours | 192 hours/position |
| Application closing date | If re-appointment: Wednesday, April 30, 2025 |
| If new appointment: Sunday, June 1, 2025 |
Course description
Critical understandings of the current housing crisis, as well as progressive policy tools and community development strategies in pursuit of housing justice.
GEOG 451 + PLAN 452: Urban Study Cap I + II, BINET (2 terms)
| Term | 2025WT2 |
| Instructor/Supervisor | Binet, Andi |
| Scheduled | We, 9:00-12:00 |
| Total estimated hours | 128 hours/position (per term) |
| Application closing date | If re-appointment: Wednesday, April 30, 2025 |
| If new appointment: Sunday, June 1, 2025 |
** IMPORTANT NOTE: Applying and accepting the offer to this position means you must be available in Term 1 and Term 2
Course description
Application of key elements of urban studies theory, concepts, and methods to a community-engaged urban challenge. URST students only.
PLAN 505: Theory, Values and Ethics, HOOPER
| Term | 2025WT2 |
| Instructor/Supervisor | Hooper, Michael |
| Scheduled | Tu, 1:00-4:00 |
| Total estimated hours | 120 hours/position |
| Application closing date | If re-appointment: Wednesday, April 30, 2025 |
| If new appointment: Sunday, June 1, 2025 |
Course description
This course undertakes an examination of planning theory, with a particular focus on values and ethics, and explores the role of these topics in planning practice and in policymaking more broadly. It builds on the foundation established in Plan 500, which focused on the history of planning and on the theories and ideas that have animated planning, as undertaken by diverse actors, over the long term. In this course, we will pay particular attention to the important values-oriented and ethical questions that planners are likely to face in their work and which are also at the centre of much scholarly work on planning. Since planning as a profession and a field of intellectual inquiry is rich in theories, we will narrow our focus on a subset of themes and questions that are likely to play an important role in students’ lives as they go on to work in planning and which can provide useful lenses for guiding decision making and action. In short, the course will seek to be as applied as a theory course can be. The course will involve extensive in-class discussion, applied case exercises and site visits.
PLAN 506: Information and Analysis in Planning, LIM
| Term | 2025WT2 |
| Instructor/Supervisor | Lim, Theodore |
| Scheduled | Mo, 1:00-4:00 |
| Total estimated hours | 120 hours/position |
| Application closing date | If re-appointment: Wednesday, April 30, 2025 |
| If new appointment: Sunday, June 1, 2025 |
Course description
In this course, students will learn how to gather and analyze information for use in community and regional planning to support decision-making. The overall objective is to help students become critical consumers, competent producers, and effective communicators of information in the field of planning. The course will cover the basics of quantitative and qualitative data and analysis methods to help students gain skills they can apply while working as planners. The course will also introduce critical perspectives of how analysis and information are used within planning and policy processes to strengthen students’ ability to recognize the limitations of these tools.
PLAN 515: Indigenous Law Governance, WALLACE
| Term | 2025WT2 |
| Instructor/Supervisor | Wallace, Wayne |
| Scheduled | Th, 6:30pm-9:30pm |
| Total estimated hours | 120 hours/position |
| Application closing date | If re-appointment: Wednesday, April 30, 2025 |
| If new appointment: Sunday, June 1, 2025 |
Course description
This course (PLAN 515) will introduce students to the laws within which Indigenous Peoples in Canada, and particularly in British Columbia, live, and which impact their communities and Nations. Students will gain an understanding of how law and governance inform planning with Indigenous communities.
PLAN 540, Planning Praxis, STEVENS (Term 2)
| Term | 2025WT1 |
| Instructor/Supervisor | Stevens, Mark |
| Scheduled | Fr, 8:00-11:00 |
| Total estimated hours | 50 hours/position |
| Application closing date | If re-appointment: Wednesday, April 30, 2025 |
| If new appointment: Sunday, June 1, 2025 |
Course description
How planning theory and practice relate to and inform each other. The role of reflection in planning practice, and how planners can improve their practice through reflecting on experience. Reflecting on the Planning Studio, and on the knowledge, skills, and attitudes learned in the MCRP program.
About UBC's and SCARP's hiring practices
Institutional Context
The University of British Columbia and the School of Community and Regional Planning acknowledges the hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓-speaking xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam people) on whose traditional, ancestral and unceded territory the University resides.
The University of British Columbia consistently ranks among the 40 best universities globally, and among the top 20 public universities in the world. Vancouver has a dynamic planning environment and is frequently rated as one of the world’s most desirable places to live. Times Higher Education (THE) ranks UBC number one in the world for taking urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts, and is ranked first in Canada for making cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable.
SCARP is internationally recognized for the excellence of its research and teaching. The School undertakes teaching and research across the sub-fields of planning, in line with being a professionally accredited planning program.
UBC Hiring Policies
At UBC, we believe that attracting and sustaining a diverse workforce is key to the successful pursuit of excellence in research, innovation, and learning for all faculty, staff and students, and is essential to fostering an outstanding work environment. Our commitment to employment equity helps achieve inclusion and fairness, brings rich diversity to UBC as a workplace, and creates the necessary conditions for a rewarding career.
About student positions
The University offers different types of student service appointments and are intended to assist properly qualified graduate students meet the cost of their studies, as well as to assist the University in meeting its educational and research objectives. Such appointments may involve part-time duties in research and other academic activities, or other academic activities and these positions are subject to availability of funds:
- Graduate Research Assistants (GRA) – non-union and funded by research grants - considered a form of Fellowship
- Graduate Academic Assistant (GAA) – student employment, non-union and hourly
- Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTA) – student employment, CUPE 2278, union – GTA I and GTA II