Department of City and Regional Planning, Cornell University

Tenure-Track Assistant Professor or early career Associate Professor in Urban Planning and the Digital Realm 

The Department of City and Regional Planning (CRP) in the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning at Cornell University invites applications for a faculty appointment as Assistant Professor or early career Associate Professor to begin on July 1, 2022.

In contemporary cities across the world, the turn to digital media and data-driven forms of governance shapes publics, informs urban policy and development (on climate change, infrastructure, and housing, for instance), and inflects in democratic practice, its erosion and its possibilities. A focus on the digital life of participation would bring to the Department of City and Regional Planning a focus on digital practices and their rootedness in the city and its infrastructure and services. It would address a variety of key themes, from: digital publics and their interplay in gendered and racialized urban inequities, the place of social media and ‘big data’ in urban democracy, and the role of digital forms of communication and their ethics. From the household to the urban and regional scales, these questions are as important to engage in data-poor parts of the global north and south as they are in the data-rich.

We seek a scholar with a critical theoretical approach and innovative methods and pedagogies—including, but not limited to, crowdsourcing data, mapping, web-scraping, critical infrastructure studies, social media analysis and other forms of urban data analytics—who draws on the qualitative social sciences, creative forms of writing and visualization and works on urban planning in the digital realm.

This hire is supported by CIVIC (Critical Inquiry into Values, Imagination and Culture), the Cornell provost’s radical collaboration task force in the Humanities and the Arts, which targets faculty hires in the fields of public life and media. As such, the successful candidate is expected to take advantage of the ability to collaborate with colleges, departments, and entities across the university.

The Department of City and Regional Planning seeks to promote vibrant communities, urban sustainability, and social equity, through its teaching, research and professional engagement. Successful applicants for this position must demonstrate high quality research through publishing and grantsmanship, excellence in teaching and advising, as well as professional engagement in the urban environment in the U.S. and internationally. Applicants should have a Ph.D. or an equivalent terminal degree in planning, regional science, geography, urban studies, public policy or another relevant field. We anticipate that candidates for this position will be able to teach a combination of workshop, lecture, and seminar courses. Salary will be commensurate with qualifications and experience.

CRP is a top-ranked planning department with 115 undergraduate majors (BS-Urban and Regional Studies), 125 master’s degree students in programs in City and Regional Planning (accredited MRP), Historic Preservation Planning (MA), and Regional Science (MA and MS), and 30 Ph.D. students in City and Regional Planning and Regional Science. The Department, with a full-time faculty of 18, draws students from across the U.S. and the world and is one of the premier programs for U.S. and international planning. As part of the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning, the department is committed to advancing scholarship in the art and science of place-making and urban design by providing a supportive, resource-rich context for collaborative studies both within the unit and across the university. Demonstrating this commitment, CRP supports dual degrees with Cornell programs in Landscape Architecture and Real Estate. Situated on Cornell University’s main campus in Ithaca, NY, the department also offers semester-long programs in New York City and Rome, Italy.

Diversity and inclusion are a part of Cornell University’s heritage. We are a recognized employer and educator valuing AA/EEO, protected veterans, and individuals with disabilities.

Cornell is committed to hiring faculty who share its commitment to educating and pursuing knowledge for any person in any study. We require that every applicant for an academic appointment provide a Statement of Contribution to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. This statement offers candidates an opportunity to describe their potential contributions to diversity and inclusion at Cornell and our legacy of “. . . any person . . . any study.” Candidates are also invited to connect their contributions to Cornell’s role as a land-grant institution enabling community improvement through research and teaching.

Required application materials:

• Curriculum vitae
• Letter of application
• Statement of research and teaching interests
• Statement of Contribution to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
• Writing samples
• List of three references with telephone numbers as well as mail and email addresses; these references will be contacted only for the later stages of the search, and with the applicant’s permission

Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis beginning Nov. 22, 2021 until an adequate pool of candidates for the position has been identified. Applicants may apply simultaneously to this hire and the AAP Cohort Hire for Social Justice and Equity. Applications to the Department of City and Regional Planning for both hires will be reviewed by the same search committee.

All applicants should submit their materials electronically to Academic Jobs Online at

https://academicjobsonline.org/ajo/jobs/20253

Further information about Cornell University; the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning; the Department of City and Regional Planning and its students, alumni, and faculty, and the CIVIC initiative, may be found at the following links:

https://aap.cornell.edu/academics/department-city-and-regional-planning

https://provost.cornell.edu/academic-initiatives/radical-collaboration/civic/

Diversity and Inclusion are a part of Cornell University’s heritage. We are a recognized employer and educator valuing AA/EEO, Protected Veterans and Individuals with Disabilities. We also recognize a lawful preference in employment practices for Native Americans living on or near Indian reservations. Cornell University is an innovative Ivy League university and a great place to work. Our inclusive community of scholars, students, and staff impart an uncommon sense of larger purpose, and contribute creative ideas to further the university’s mission of teaching, discovery, and engagement.