Overseas Study Programs
Urban Studies encourages students to consider studying abroad, to learn firsthand how cities vary across societies.
Timing is important; Urban Studies majors should try to be on campus to take the required senior seminar (URBANST 203) and the required junior seminar (URBANST 202A). Many students find that they can count some courses taken off-campus or overseas toward their Urban Studies major, making their time away from campus more academically productive and rewarding.
Stanford Overseas Studies Program
Through the Bing Overseas Studies Program, Urban Studies students have the opportunity to study and, in many cases, to intern at locations around the world. Many overseas campuses offer courses that can count for credit toward an Urban Studies major! You can take Urban Studies courses in Beijing, Berlin, Cape Town, Florence, Madrid, Oxford, Paris, and Santiago!
Non-Stanford Overseas Programs
We include here a short list of overseas programs offered by other universities that may be of particular interest to Urban Studies students. For more comprehensive information on study abroad through non-Stanford programs, consult the website or visit Stanford’s Bechtel International Center.
Note that, in order to receive credit at Stanford, courses taken at another university’s overseas program must be approved by the Office of the University Registrar, including external coursework, which must be approved before it can be considered for credit toward the Urban Studies major.
- Columbia University: Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation
- The Shape of Two Cities: New York-Paris: The Shape of Two Cities: New York-Paris is a program for undergraduates enrolled in other universities that offers a year's exposure to architecture, urban planning and historic preservation in New York and Paris.
- Cornell University: Art, Architecture, and Planning Department
- Program in Rome: Cornell’s program in Rome offers courses in architecture, art, and urban studies, architecture history, art history, drawing, photography, architecture theory, contemporary Italian culture, European politics and Italian language. The Urban Studies component of the program is offered spring quarter.
- International Honors Program
- IHP has developed programs in a group of important world cities where exciting changes are happening, including New York City, Sao Paulo/Curitiba, Cape Town, Auckland, Bangalore, Beijing, Buenos Aires, and Istanbul. The program builds each semester’s itinerary from among these cities.
- The International Honors Programs are offered in affiliation with the School for International Training (SIT), the accredited higher education division of World Learning. The Department of Urban Studies and Planning at the Massachusetts Institute for Technology (MIT) is a partner in the Cities in the 21st Century program.
Questions about how overseas study fits with your Urban Studies interests?