In the 2023-2024 academic year, Kent State University's MLA program emphasized issues of current urban landscape discourses: through partnerships in Cleveland and with Kent State's, nationally renowned Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative (CUDC). They were co-located in the vibrant heart of Downtown Cleveland.

The curriculum and outreach focus on the transformative role of landscape architecture in the urban landscape and industrial valley. The six studios explored pressing issues including adaptive public spaces, access to the region's waterfronts, urban forestry and canopy plans, ecological infrastructure, living architecture, and mobility. Our program has been recognized with awards and we can travel and engage the profession.

 

Aya Keskeso (MLA 24) was awarded a $5,000 scholarship from the Landscape Architecture Foundation as one of three finalists for the Olmstead Scholars Program. Her research for the valley-wadi Derna zone creates a storytelling platform aimed at empowering restoration and activism as a form of environmental justice in post-disaster landscapes. Keskeso also won the 2024 Ohio ASLA Student Honor Award for her third-year Masters Project "Comfort for All while Climate and Homeless Populations Rise" advised by Assistant Professor, Charles Frederick, and Associate Professor Cat Marshall. Asmita Dahal MLA (24) won the Ohio ASLA Student Honor Award in recognition of her third-year Studio Project "Lake Erie Marginal Freshwater Park" advised by Associate Professor Cat Marshall.

Dahal and Keskeso were also National Prep Fellows of Green Roofs for healthy cities to advance their studies of vegetative roof systems advised by Professor Reid Coffman PhD.

The program actively engaged with professionals in community engagement workshops, parking day events, and volunteering at the National ASLA meeting, and Ohio Chapter of ASLA annual meeting in Cleveland, and the TCLF What's Out There Weekend in Cleveland.

Our college lecture series included landscape architect Illmar Hurkxkens of TU Delft who in the fall led a program Terrain Workshop on current technological advances of his research.

Spring 2024 second-year studio traveled to New York City to visit design offices (MMVA, Scape, Field Operations, and SWA / Balsley), and waterfront projects. The highlight was a four-hour guided walk of Brooklyn Bridge Park with Matt Urbanski of MMVA.