As part of their capstone project, second-year graduate students from the University of Iowa’s School of Urban & Regional Planning will update Mason City’s 2006 Comprehensive Plan, with a thematic view towards environmental and social resiliency and a topical focus on aging in place.

Students in a course in the School of Planning and Public Affairs examined ways to reignite Clinton's Mayor's Youth Commission. They made recommendations about this entity, as well as other ways to better engage teens in the civic fabric of the community.

Graduate students in the School of Planning and Public Affairs will work in consultation with the City of Manning, the City of Stanton, the City of Cedar Rapids, and Iowa AARP to help Iowa communities reach "age-friendly" status. 

For a community to reach "age-friendly" status, they must demonstrate progress towards making communities livable, quality places for all ages. More information about the "age-friendly" program can be found here:

As part of the project students will:

Marketing teams in the Tippie College of Business Marketing Institute developed multiple options for new branding, including logos and taglines, for the City of Sabula.

Marketing teams in the Tippie College of Business Marketing Institute developed multiple options for new branding, including logos and taglines, for the City of Preston.

Marketing teams in the Tippie College of Business Marketing Institute developed multiple options for new branding, including logos and taglines, for the City of Bellevue. 

Students enrolled in the School of Planning and Public Affairs Public Policy and Persuasion course worked with key stakeholders in Maquoketa to develop a set of proposed policy initiatives to enhance youth civic engagement opportunities and involvement in the community.  

Young people under the age of 21 make up 28.3% of Maquoketa’s population. Opportunities for youth civic participation in Maquoketa are limited, and community leaders are looking to find new, more effective ways to engage with the young population.  

Students enrolled in the School of Planning and Public Affairs Public Policy and Persuasion course worked with Maquoketa leaders to develop a set of proposed policy initiatives for welcoming newcomers to the Maquoketa community.  

Students enrolled in the School of Planning and Public Affairs Public Policy and Persuasion course worked with Maquoketa leaders to develop a set of proposed policy solutions for increasing civic volunteerism across all demographics in Maquoketa.  

Students in the ICIGO student organization within the Department of Geographical and Sustainability Sciences created visually-appealing and dynamic maps to show organizational and jurisdictional subsections of Waterloo.

The team used GIS applications to create a user-friendly online map that allows residents to easily access boundary information of distinct parts of the city, including all 31 neighborhood associations, wards and precincts, census tracts, and more.

The Waterloo Public Library sought to understand how account holders were spread across Waterloo in order to identify areas that may need to be better served.  Addresses of existing account holders were mapped with GIS, which provided several opportunities for further analysis, including account holders outside of city boundaries, households not using WPL services, and more.

Juniors in the Tippie College of Business Marketing Institute developed a marketing strategy to help the Waterloo Public Library increase outreach to the business community in Waterloo.