Graduate Degree
Master of Community and Regional Planning (MCRP)
Lead change. Build communities. Advance equitable futures.
The Master of Community and Regional Planning is an accredited professional degree that prepares students to become planners, advocates, and changemakers in communities across the Southwest and beyond. Students learn how to analyze complex problems, engage diverse stakeholders, and develop plans, policies, and strategies that improve quality of life.
Our curriculum combines planning theory, policy, data analysis, visualization, land use, and community engagement with real-world projects for public agencies, tribal governments, nonprofits, and community organizations. Students can choose any of these specializations or blend them into hybrids that align with their goals:
- Community Development: Reducing inequality, expanding opportunity, community-based economic development, and strategies that enhance quality of life through participatory planning and community partnerships.
- Indigenous Planning: Engaging in an emerging paradigm grounded in culturally responsive, value-based approaches to community development, placemaking, and the seven generations model.
- Natural Resources and Environmental Planning: Addressing planning and policy challenges involving natural systems, environmental justice, water resources, climate adaptation, sustainability, and public health.
- Physical Planning and Development: Shaping the built environment through land use, transportation, urban design, housing, infrastructure, growth management, and other aspects of physical planning.
What sets UNM apart is our commitment to place-based, community-centered planning rooted in the cultures, landscapes, and challenges of the Southwest. Students graduate with professional experience, strong analytical and communication skills, and a portfolio of work that prepares them for leadership in the planning profession.
The MCRP requires a minimum of 42 credit hours. Full-time students can complete the degree in approximately two academic years, and part-time options are available. Students complete core courses, concentration coursework, electives, and a culminating experience through either a capstone studio, professional project, or thesis. Read more information about the curriculum.
Graduate minor I Community and Regional Planning:
The Graduate Minor in Community and Regional Planning provides students from a wide range of graduate disciplines with the knowledge and tools to understand how communities, regions, and places evolve and how public decisions shape social, economic, and environmental outcomes. Through coursework in planning, policy, community engagement, and place-based problem solving, students gain practical skills that complement their primary field of study while deepening their ability to work collaboratively with diverse communities. The minor is especially valuable for students interested in sustainability, public service, community development, environmental issues, public health, design, Indigenous communities, and social equity.
Why add a CRP Minor?
- Apply planning perspectives to your graduate discipline.
- Build skills in community engagement, policy analysis, and collaborative problem-solving.
- Explore issues of sustainability, equity, and regional development.
- Gain a broader understanding of how people, places, and institutions shape communities.
- Enhance career opportunities in public, nonprofit, and private-sector organizations.
Dual degree options
In addition to its regular degree, the MCRP program offers dual degrees in Latin American Studies, Public Administration, and Water Resources that allow students to expand their education in interdisciplinary ways. Students interested in a dual degree must apply for admission to each program.
