Vision & Mission

The department has developed six fundamental and shared values in response to our stated mission and vision. These values serve as benchmark learning outcomes that we believe to be core to the discipline of landscape architecture and by which our students can be measured. These core values can be seen as a set of learning objectives that support and ensure acquisition of the university's learning outcomes.

Standard 1: Local Context

Establish a fundamental understanding of the local context through immersion of place.

• Cultivate a fundamental understanding and appreciation of local context complexity in order to respond authentically to ecological, social, and formal qualities.
• Discern patterns and systems at all scales.
• Recognize resources and inequities.

Standard 2: Ethics

Develop professional values and ethics so students can critically assess actions and implications.

• Develop and refine an ethical system regarding environmental alteration and management.
• Develop an understanding of the ethical implications of short and long-term decision-making concerning the environment.
• Develop a process of assessing values and their effect on environmental and landscape quality.

Standard 3: Critical Thinking

Foster critical thinking that enables creative and balanced judgments in:

• Inclusive investigation that engages the sciences and arts.
• Appropriate and defensible applications.
• Reflective criticism that drives creative problem solving.

Standard 4: Vision

Maintain a "contemporary" curriculum that recognizes the dynamic relationships and long-term consequences of complex systems that produce emergent visions of landscape. In order to critically assess these visions and communicate them to others, the curriculum will promote appropriate representation.

• Encourage the greater influence of the arts (including but not limited to painting, sculpture, installation, photography, collage, poetry, literature, and film).
• Employ relevant methods of communication from the kindred arts and sciences.
• Engage innovative professional tools and materials.
• Inculcate a comprehensive understanding of histories and theories.
• Recognize that visionary results stem from persistence - doing your homework - as well as recognizing opportunities.

Standard 5: Enterprise

Establish a mentality that individuals should possess the tools and resources to recognize systems and connections and to act as an agent for change.

• Appraise opportunities in the context of ethical concerns.
• Comprehend the issue of risk in enterprise as both a necessity and management responsibility.
• Understand that the issues of creative enterprise must engage inclusiveness in the distribution of gains.

Standard 6: Collaboration

Recognize that landscape problems extend across multiple geographical, cultural, and disciplinary boundaries. By working with individuals and groups towards common goals we realize values, broaden resources, and enrich experiences. Effective problem-solving requires the ability to see different viewpoints, to engage interfaces, and to exchange ideas.

• Provide cross-cultural experiences.
• Encourage interdisciplinary collaboration.
• Create teamwork opportunities.
• Stress communication skills between disciplines.
• Cultivate open minds and broadened viewpoints

The department has developed five fundamental strategies in response to our stated mission and vision that guide the department's planning and development.  

Strategy 1: Support a strong undergraduate program focusing on the development of sound thinking skills and personal vision, in the context of the broad range of landscape architectural activities and technical skills.

Objectives:

• Foster students' creative and critical thinking skills, as well as their ability to apply these skills to resolve ecological, social and aesthetic problems within the context of environmental design.
• Imbue students with a sense of responsibility to ecological, social, aesthetic and professional issues.
• Give students a strong foundation in design, including an understanding of fundamental principles: form and space creation, design process. Enable students to apply design principles and process to the broad spectrum of landscape architectural activities.
• Equip students a strong understanding of natural patterns and processes at multiple scales. Instill awareness of design and planning strategies to address ecological problems, including preservation, restoration, regenerative design, and sustainable use of resources.
• Provide students with a strong understanding of cultural patterns and processes at multiple scales, and an awareness of challenges and strategies related to planning and design within a multicultural society.
• Pursue challenging educational and service opportunities within Southern California, taking advantage of its diverse ecological environment and one of the world's largest multicultural communities.
• Expose students to a variety of professional roles and contexts including individual projects, team projects, and interdisciplinary collaboration.
• Impart the technical skills and knowledge necessary for landscape design, planning, construction, and professional practice as it relates to ecological sustainability, efficiency, practicality and the protection of public health, safety, and welfare.
• Instill hands-on computer proficiency in students, as well as an understanding and awareness of innovations in information technology and their implications for planning, design process, and product.

Strategy 2: Support a strong graduate program focusing on the development of sound thinking skills, personal vision, and collective knowledge of the discipline, with a particular emphasis on human eco-systematic design principles.

Objectives:

• Foster students' creative and critical thinking skills, as well as their ability to apply these skills to resolve ecological, social and aesthetic problems within the context of environmental design.
• Imbue students with a sense of responsibility to ecological, social, aesthetic and professional issues.
• Provide students with a strong foundation in sustainability, regeneration, and eco-systematic design.
• Give students a strong understanding of ecological patterns and processes at multiple scales, and an awareness of design and planning strategies to address ecological problems including, preservation, restoration, regenerative design, and sustainable use of resources.
• Provide students with a strong understanding of cultural patterns and processes at multiple scales, as well as an awareness of challenges and strategies related to planning and design within a multicultural society.
• Pursue challenging educational and service opportunities within Southern California, taking advantage of its diverse ecological environment and one of the world's largest multicultural communities.
• Expose students to a variety of professional roles and contexts including individual projects, team projects, and interdisciplinary collaboration.
• Impart the technical skills and knowledge necessary for landscape design, planning, construction, and professional practice at all scales of concern. Give particular emphasis to ecological sustainability, efficiency, practicality, and the protection of public health, safety, and welfare.
• Instill computer proficiency in students, as well as an understanding and awareness of innovations in information technology and their implications for planning, design process, and product.
• Develop students' ability to pursue scholarly research.

Strategy 3: Foster an outstanding and well-rounded group of faculty who contribute to the department's mission through teaching, research, community service, and professional practice.

Objectives:

• Foster a diverse full-time faculty possessing skills and perspectives deemed critical to maintaining the department's knowledge, vision, values, and mission.
• Foster a diverse and stable part-time faculty possessing skills and perspectives that complement the contributions of full-time faculty.
• Seek to maintain teaching excellence within the department, consistent with university standards.
• Foster research and scholarly activities among faculty members.
• Support creative activities and professional practice among full and part-time faculty members.
• Ensure continued service to the university and college by faculty on behalf of the department.
• Support community service by faculty on behalf of the department.
• Actively support professional development of all faculty, particularly probationary and part-time faculty.
• Maintain resources so that faculty can remain on the cutting edge of teaching, research, and service.

Strategy 4: Recruit and retain a critical mass of high-caliber, diverse students for graduate and undergraduate study.

Objectives:

• Actively recruit high-quality graduate and undergraduate students in cost-effective ways: via the department website, media contacts, advertisements, and involving alumni.
• Seek to increase enrollment in populations more representative of Southern California.
• Increase student retention rates through examining causes of attrition.
• Provide well-equipped, lighted, and maintained facilities for student work and critiques. Use university facilities for presentations that reflect the professionalism of student work.
• Use off-campus opportunities as teaching and learning environments, particularly field trips, service learning projects, study abroad programs,and internships.
• Foster "vertical" (between years in the graduate and undergraduate programs, as well as alumni) and "horizontal" (between graduate students and other disciplines) interaction and learning opportunities.

Strategy 5: Maintain a respected and influential role within the college, university, profession, and region.

Objectives:

• Involve alumni and other professional groups, such as ASLA or CELA, in articulating the importance of the program on a national and regional level.
• Encourage promotion of the program through increased visibility of student, faculty, and alumni work.
• Encourage "colleagueship" between graduates of the department.
• Meet regularly with the dean and encourage faculty participation on university committees to convey the importance of the small but critical profession.
• Enhance the planning, development, and management of resources within the department.