Sustainable Lands and Cities

The climate emergency brings an urgent awareness of the inter-relationships between land and human development. The pervasive exploitation of natural systems means populations face fundamental challenges for their future.

Sustainable Lands and Cities brings together people who are committed to creating, shaping, and conserving sustainable communities. The program is designed for both recent graduates and professionals from a wide variety of backgrounds in the public, private, and third sectors.

The Sustainable Lands and Citiesprogram at The University of Edinburgh equips students with the skills to influence and create resilient and sustainable relationships between lands and cities. This will be explored in both rural and urban environments, harnessing practices of smart growth, understanding planetary boundaries, and advocacy for justice and equity.

Postgraduate study at the Edinburgh Futures Institute

This program is part of an interconnected portfolio of postgraduate study in the Edinburgh Futures Institute (EFI). EFI supports interdisciplinary teaching, learning and research that is focused on complex global and social challenges. Our programs are all taught by academic experts from many different subject areas. As an EFI student, you will develop creative, critical and data-informed thinking that cuts across traditional disciplinary boundaries. You will have the space to think deeply about questions linked to your own passions and professional goals, and will develop a project based on an issue that you care about.

As well as knowledge specific to your area of study, studying at EFI will give you the skills and understanding you need to become a creative, confident and critical citizen in a fast-changing world. These will include:

• core data skills
• data ethics
• the ability to interrogate issues of global scope
• the creative and analytic approaches to knowledge that are vital for building better futures

You can join us regardless of whether you already have skills in the use and application of digital data.

Career opportunities

The core elements of this program address the data and higher-order skills we know are important for the future of work, confident and critical citizenship, and a thriving, just society. Graduates will be able to work collaboratively to create and execute sustainable strategies in the workplace. Our graduates will have cross-disciplinary skills and understanding to support decision-making in complex environments.

Graduates have a range of career opportunities available, both for existing professionals and newer entrants to the job market including:

• Public, private and voluntary sector organisations with an increasing need to respond and create sustainable development policy, drivers and targets.

• Consultancy and environmental planning sector which is developing multidisciplinary interventions to address and mitigate climate change

• Businesses and commercial operators looking to anticipate and engage with new perceptions and policy frameworks for climate change.

Courses include:

• Envisioning Sustainable Lands and Cities

• Evaluating Sustainable Lands and Cities

• The EcoCity

• Regenerating Place

• A Systemic Approach to Sustainability

• Data, Mobility and Infrastructure