A Process Of Learning: Planning Education At East Carolina University

What was the planning profession like a quarter century ago? For one thing, old timers may recall that a substantial number of planners did not hold planning degrees while those with degrees were mainly graduates of master's level programs. Within the Southeast Chapter of the American Institute of Planners (SEAIP) only Georgia Tech and the University of North Carolina were granting planning degrees at that time. As the demand for planners grew in the late 1950s and 1960s, planning schools were hard pressed to produce enough graduates, and planning agencies sometimes recruited entry-level personnel from disciplines such as architecture, engineering, geography, and political science. These developments set the stage for the establishment of an undergraduate planning curriculum at East Carolina University in Greenville, North Carolina. In this article the authors trace the evolution of undergraduate planning education at East Carolina University (ECU) with emphasis on curriculum development