CAPLA Equity, Diversity & Inclusion News & Headlines

View the latest news and headlines relating to equity, diversity and inclusion initiatives, projects and research at the College of Architecture, Planning and Landscape Architecture.

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Ghana street and residences

Ghana Digitized Its Address System: Its Failure Offers Lessons to Other African Countries Creating Smart Cities

Research by Seth Asare Okyere, CAPLA visiting assistant professor of urban planning, and Louis Kusi Frimpong, Matthew Abunyewah and Stephen Kofi Diko, show that digitalization initiatives in Ghana need to take local factors and engagement into account if they’re going to succeed.

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Ghana

Ghana’s Informal Residents Show How Social Innovation Can Solve Urban Challenges

A recent paper by Seth Asare Okyere, CAPLA visiting assistant professor of urban planning, and Stephen Kofie Diko, assistant professor at the University of Memphis, argues that the solutions residents in poor, marginalized, informal and crowded urban areas come up with to make everyday urban life livable are a form of social innovation.

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Camp Naco

Award-Winning Heritage Conservation Efforts by CAPLA Faculty and Students Lead to $4.6M in State Restoration Funding for Buffalo Soldier Camp

CAPLA Heritage Conservation Program Project Director Helen Erickson and graduate students Sarah McDowell and Teresa DeKoker have been instrumental in efforts to preserve Camp Naco, a borderlands Buffalo Soldier camp located near Bisbee, Arizona, resulting in awards for their story map and new funding to preserve the site.

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Eduardo Guerrero

Crossing City Limits (and International Time Zones): CAPLA's Eduardo Guerrero on His Popular Urban Podcast

Though the pandemic was a challenge for many, for CAPLA Senior Lecturer in Architecture and Urban Design Eduardo Guerrero it presented a new opportunity—connecting ideas from urbanism experts around the world through conversations, resulting in his urban podcast, Crossing City Limits. Learn more in this fascinating interview.

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Sandra Bernal Cordove

Learning as Rich Experience: Sandra Bernal Cordova, Lecturer and UArizona Hispanic Serving Institution Fellow

UArizona Hispanic Serving Institution Fellow Sandra Bernal Cordova, who joined CAPLA in 2018 as a lecturer, uses her built environment research, community service and cross-campus collaborations to inform the classes she teaches and co-teaches, which include Water Efficiency in Building, Equitable Cities and the Sustainable Built Environments Capstone.

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Zsalina Allen

Sustainable Scandinavian Pursuits: Zsalina Allen ’23 MS Urban Planning

This summer, graduate student Zsalina Allen participated in a sustainable transportation study abroad program in Denmark and Sweden. She documented her travels in a fascinating and entertaining blog. We followed up to learn more about her experience in Scandinavia, as well her UArizona MS Urban Planning experience.

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Broadway Boulevard at Swan Road intersection, looking east

Award-Winning Report by CAPLA Urban Planning Students Envisions Equitable, Accessible Public Transportation for Underdeveloped Corridors in Tucson

Last spring, Master of Science in Urban Planning students in Associate Professor Kristina Curran's capstone course published the report Thriving Transit Corridors: Driving Transit-Oriented Development Along Tucson’s Broadway Corridor, which has been awarded the 2022 Student Project Award by the Arizona chapter of the American Planning Association.

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Seth Asare Okyere

Deep Engagement with Local Communities: Seth Asare Okyere, Visiting Assistant Professor of Urban Planning and Emerging Faculty Fellow

Seth Asare Okyere joined the college this semester as visiting assistant professor of urban planning as part of CAPLA's inaugural emerging faculty fellow program. Learn more about Seth, including his current research on socio-spatial and environmental aspects of everyday southern urban experiences in relation to social equity and community resilience planning.

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Boise, Idaho skyline

CAPLA Launches Externship Program to Promote Student Professional Development While Building Deeper Relationships with Industry

CAPLA undergraduate architecture students Kaya Orona, Celestin Amani and Anisa Hermosillo held externships at The M Group in Washington, D.C., Onyx Creative in Tucson, Arizona, and erstad ARCHITECTS in Boise, Idaho last spring break. Learn more about their experiences and the benefits externships offer for both students and sponsoring firms.