“Cities Are Places, Too”: Urban Studies Education at the Secondary Level

Recent scholarship has pointed to the necessity of critical, community-engaged, place-based education at the K-12 level, but the field has neglected a powerful tool for developing active citizens and engaged community members: urban studies. This project includes a six session curriculum meant to be taught at the secondary level in an urban setting to introduce high school students to themes in urban studies, provide space for them to critically engage with their understandings and experiences of place, and share pathways for concrete change around the manifestation of social issues of concern in the physical landscape. The course was taught in the Spring of 2025 at a local public high school, and the project details both the curriculum itself and reflections and implications around the implementation of the course. The study is grounded in and builds upon work around place-based learning, critical and community engaged praxes, critical studies of place and the personal nature of place, grassroots urban planning, and more.