Advanced Landscape Planning and Management MSc

Overview

The Advanced Landscape Planning and Management MSc is an innovative one-year postgraduate programme. This course will provide you with the intellectual and practical skills required for effective landscape planning and management.

As a landscape planner or landscape manager, you will design, care for, and maintain the countryside, as well as urban and coastal landscapes. You will ensure that these landscapes meet the needs and aspirations of present and future owners, communities and users.

What you will learn on our Master’s will be relevant worldwide. You’ll develop the skills needed to tackle key challenges facing contemporary society:

• climate change
• species loss
• rapid urbanisation
• migration (human and non-human)
• social justice and belonging
• heritage restoration

This Advanced Landscape Planning and Management course is suitable for:

• graduates in other disciplines who wish to qualify as professional landscape planners and managers
• landscape planners or managers who want to secure an academic qualification
• those with international landscape qualifications (or related disciplines) who wish to pursue professional studies in the UK
• those interested in advanced level research in landscape planning, landscape management, and landscape studies

Important information

We've highlighted important information about your course. Please take note of any deadlines.

Your course and study experience - disclaimers and terms and conditions

Please rest assured we make all reasonable efforts to provide you with the programmes, services and facilities described. However, it may be necessary to make changes due to significant disruption, for example in response to Covid-19.

View our Academic experience page, which gives information about your Newcastle University study experience for the academic year 2024-25.

See our terms and conditions and student complaints information, which gives details of circumstances that may lead to changes to programmes, modules or University services.

 

What you'll learn

Our Advanced Landscape Planning and Management Master’s involves classroom-led and fieldwork-led learning.

This course will help you develop and demonstrate the ability to:

• think critically about planning and management in relation to long-term stewardship of landscapes
• understand the complexities of landscape issues and opportunities, applying knowledge from across the curriculum
• devise effective planning and management solutions to landscape problems
• respond creatively to complex landscape planning and management briefs
• generate well-considered proposals that show understanding of context, scale and time
• evaluate materials, processes and techniques and integrate these into feasible strategies
• understand how landscape has been conceptualised and theorised throughout history
• evaluate the philosophies, ideologies and critical positions which underpin different approaches to landscape research
• engage with complex ideas and a range of stakeholders

This course is intellectually stimulating. It builds on our staff's international research reputation and teaching strengths in:

• climate crisis, green infrastructure and nature-based thinking
• interspecies relations
• critical social and political landscape approaches
• advanced landscape research skills

Newcastle University's Centre for Research Excellence in Landscape creates a matchless environment for interdisciplinary research-informed teaching in landscape. Leading organisations, institutions and authorities responsible for managing landscapes provide additional input.

Modules

You will study modules on this course. A module is a unit of a course with its own approved aims and outcomes and assessment methods.

Course content changes

Module information is intended to provide an example of what you will study.

Our teaching is informed by research. Course content changes periodically to reflect developments in the discipline, the requirements of external bodies and partners, and student feedback.

Full details of the modules on offer will be published through the Programme Regulations and Specifications ahead of each academic year. This usually happens in May.

To find out more please see our terms and conditions.

Optional modules availability

Some courses have optional modules. Student demand for optional modules may affect availability.

 

Advanced Landscape Planning and Management MSc modules

Compulsory Modules	Credits
Conceptualising Landscape	20
Landscape Histories	10
Design with Plants and Ecological Greenspace Management	20
Landscape Planning and Management: Professional Skills and Practice	20
Landscape Planning and Management Dissertation	60
Engagement with environment, landscape and planning	10
Green Infrastructure, Landscape Planning & Nature Based Solutions	10
Green Infrastructure, Landscape Planning and Nature Based Solutions (Project)	10
Research Design	10
Environmental Assessment	10

How you'll learn

Delivery and teaching methods

You’ll be taught using a range of methods, including:

• online and in-person lectures
• seminars
• workshops
• studios
• study sites and field trips (UK and International*)

*additional fees apply

Assessment methods

Depending on your modules, you'll be assessed through a combination of:

• Design or creative project
• Dissertation
• Essay
• Oral presentation
• Portfolio
• Report
• Reflective log
• Written examination

Student support

Your teaching and learning is also supported by Canvas. Canvas is a Virtual Learning Environment. You'll use Canvas to submit your assignments and access your:

• module handbooks
• course materials
• groups
• course announcements and notifications
• written feedback

Throughout your studies, you’ll have access to support from:

• peers
• academics
• personal tutors
• our University Student Services Team
• student representatives

You'll also be assigned an academic member of staff. They will be your personal tutor throughout your time with us. They can help with academic and personal issues.

Your development

You’ll develop subject-specific professional and research skills, including:

• defining and critically analysing landscape problems, drawing on current research and knowledge
• collecting, synthesising and utilising evidence for effective and socio-ecologically-just landscape planning and management
• creating effective planning and management solutions to landscape problems
• articulating reasoned arguments, drawing on a range of information sources
• assessing the intersecting social and environmental complexities of landscape issues, constraints and opportunities
• ethical issues surrounding the creation, planning and management of landscapes
• high-level academic research skills in relation to landscape projects
• advanced  research methods for understanding the needs of, and engaging communities

You will develop specialist practical skills, including:

• conducting site planning and site assessments
• landscape management and green infrastructure planning and maintenance strategies
• site-led management and maintenance resolutions and their implementation
• contributing to detailed assessments such as environmental assessments
• applying policy documents, legislation and good practice for long-term landscape stewardship
• budgets and resource assessment
• critical approaches to the rationales and techniques applied to the preparation and deliverance of landscape planning and management solutions
• the ability to ‘read’ landscapes, past, present and future

In addition, you will gain valuable transferable skills. These include project management, presentation skills and communication with both specialist and non-specialist audiences. You will also develop important self-management skills such as setting priorities and time management.

Your future

What can you do with an Advanced Landscape Planning and Management MSc?

This Master’s course will prepare you for an exciting career in landscape planning and landscape management. You will be ready to pursue dynamic job roles in diverse fields. You could go on to plan or manage:

• national parks
• coastlines
• heritage sites
• nature reserves
• environmental or forestry agencies
• wilding projects
• seascapes/water management

You will also be well placed to continue your studies at PhD level.

Our industry links

We have strong governmental, charitable, and industry links with:

• local governments
• National Parks (especially in the North East)
• Northumberland Wildlife Trust
• the Environment Agency
• Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA)
• Community Forest
• European Forum on Urban Forestry
• Clearing House
• Natural England
• The National Trust
• Scottish Natural Heritage
• the European Commission
• Swiss Peace

We also have long-term sustained relationships with professional bodies including:

• The Landscape Institute
• The Landscape Research Group
• The Royal Town Planning Institute
• The Royal Geographical Society with the Institute of British Geographers

What our graduates say

"At Newcastle University, there are a lot of interesting teaching methods; my favourite one is the fieldtrip, because this kind of hands-on experience of the landscape can't be obtained by reading books and lectures. You use your body to understand the landscape. In my postgraduate year, I have also learnt a lot about landscape theory and history, and I have gained a better understanding of what landscape 'is'. The teacher(s) always provide space to think, feel, experience and innovate. Teachers do not deny your ideas, but encourage you, that everything is possible"

(Clara 2023-2024)

"The most intellectually stimulating aspect of the course is that it requires more critical thinking and knowledge of different disciplines (...). I believe that the course I have studied will be very helpful for my future career, and I have felt exactly how strong and deep the landscape culture is during my year of study in the UK. My experience at Newcastle University has been comfortable, from the time I first arrived in the city alone, to the time I finally left, by which time I felt a very secure sense of belonging, both on a School level and on a social level"

(Renjie 2023-2024)

Our Careers Service

Our award-winning Careers Service is one of the largest and best in the country, and we have strong links with employers. We provide an extensive range of opportunities to all students through our ncl+ initiative.

Visit our Careers Service website

Quality and ranking

All professional accreditations are reviewed regularly by their professional body

Recognition of professional qualifications outside of the UK

From 1 January 2021 there is an update to the way professional qualifications are recognised by countries outside of the UK

Check the government’s website for more information.

Facilities

During your studies, you will have access to the state-of-the-art facilities at the School of Architecture, Planning & Landscape.

Fees and funding

Tuition fees for 2025 entry (per year)

Tuition fee increases

As a general principle, you should expect the tuition fee to increase in each subsequent academic year of your course, subject to government regulations on fee increases and in line with inflation.

EU, other EEA and Swiss nationals - tuition fee status

Depending on your residency history, if you’re a student from the EU, other EEA or a Swiss national, with settled or pre-settled status under the EU Settlement Scheme, you’ll normally pay the ‘Home’ tuition fee rate and may be eligible for Student Finance England support.

EU students without settled or pre-settled status will normally be charged fees at the ‘International’ rate and will not be eligible for Student Finance England support. You will be eligible for a scholarship worth 15% off the international fee. 

If you are unsure of your fee status, check out the latest guidance here.

Scholarships

We support our EU and international students by providing a generous range of Vice-Chancellor's automatic and merit-based scholarships. See our searchable postgraduate funding page for more information. 

What you're paying for

Tuition fees include the costs of:

• matriculation
• registration
• tuition (or supervision)
• library access
• examination
• re-examination
• graduation

Find out more about:

• living costs
• tuition fees

Deposit

If you are an international student or a student from the EU, EEA or Switzerland and you need a visa to study in the UK, you may have to pay a deposit.

You can check this in the How to apply section.

Funding deadlines

If you're applying for funding, always check the funding application deadline. This deadline may be earlier than the application deadline for your course.

For some funding schemes, you need to have received an offer of a place on a course before you can apply for the funding.

Search for funding

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INTO International Pre-Master's - Pathway course

Our Architecture and Landscape Architecture Pre-Master's will prepare you for Master's study at Newcastle. If you're successful then you're guaranteed a place on this Master's course.

• Architecture and Landscape Architecture Pre-Master's

 

How to apply

Using the application portal

The application portal has instructions to guide you through your application. It will tell you what documents you need and how to upload them.

You can choose to start your application, save your details and come back to complete it later.

 

If you’re ready, you can select Apply Online and you’ll be taken directly to the application portal.

Alternatively you can find out more about applying on our applications and offers pages.

Apply Online  

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