Applications open for 2024-25 UPL Graduate Fellowships

March 13, 2024 in News

UPL grad fellows

The Urban Policy Lab’s Graduate Fellows program offers Munk students interested in cities and urban policy the chance to participate in unique experiential learning opportunities, help coordinate the School’s urban-oriented extracurricular programming, and contribute to the Lab’s collaborative research, civic education, and outreach projects.

Eligibility and Financial Support

Up to four fellowships are available to second-year MPP or MGA students. Each fellowship comes with a $3,000 tuition bursary, in recognition of the time commitment involved (approx. 10-15 hours/week, September 2024 to April 2025).

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Programming update: 2023-24 academic year

June 27, 2023 in News

A programming note for our students at the Munk School and our partners across Toronto: I will be on leave for the 2023-24 academic year, to take up a visiting fellowship at the London School of Economics and Political Science. As a result, most Lab activities, including the UPL fellowship program, will be temporarily paused until my return.

Gabriel Eidelman, PhD
Director, Urban Policy Lab
Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy
University of Toronto

Recap: 2023 UPL Case Competition

February 4, 2023 in Events

On February 3, more than 30 Master of Public Policy and Master of Global Affairs students at the Munk School participated in the 2023 Urban Policy Lab Case Competition. This year’s competition focused on food insecurity in Toronto. Students were asked to develop a strategy that the City of Toronto could implement to increase access to affordable, nutritious, and culturally appropriate food in underserved communities.

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Recap: Munk in the City 2022

October 25, 2022 in Events

Munk in the City 2022

Munk in the City is an experiential learning initiative organized by the Urban Policy Lab, and supported by the University of Toronto’s School of Cities, that asks students to step out of the classroom and into the community to grapple with urban policy issues first-hand. In the weeks leading up to the 2022 Toronto municipal election, teams of students from both the Master of Public Policy and Master of Global Affairs programs ventured out to all corners of the city to explore and report on key issues and concerns. To see all student submissions, visit the project’s Padlet page. In this blog post, Graduate Fellow Luca Dannetta picks out a few of his favourite submissions.

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Recap: 2022 UPL Case Competition

March 31, 2022 in Events

UPL Case competition winners 2022

On January 21, twenty-two Master of Public Policy and Master of Global Affairs students at the Munk School participated in the 2022 Urban Policy Lab Case Competition. This year’s competition focused on the economic integration of newcomers to Toronto. Students were asked to develop a strategy that the City of Toronto could implement based on the priorities introduced in the newly published 2022-2026 Toronto Newcomer Strategy. 

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Applications open for 2022-23 UPL Graduate Fellowships

February 18, 2022 in News

UPL grad fellows

The Urban Policy Lab’s Graduate Fellows program offers Munk students interested in cities and urban policy the chance to participate in unique experiential learning opportunities, help coordinate the School’s urban-oriented extracurricular programming, and contribute to the Lab’s collaborative research, civic education, and outreach projects.

Eligibility and Financial Support

Up to four fellowships are available to second-year MPP or MGA students. Each fellowship comes with a $3,000 tuition bursary, in recognition of the time commitment involved (approx. 10-15 hours/week, September 2022 to April 2023).

Continue reading »

Urban Issues in the 2021 Federal Election

September 17, 2021 in News

Recent polling shows that the cities and suburbs of Canada’s leading metropolitan regions, particularly in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) and Metropolitan Vancouver, are critical battlegrounds for the September 20th federal election. Although COVID-19 and healthcare are at the forefront of most urban voters’ minds, it is beneficial to look at other policy areas that impact cities.

Although provincial governments and city halls make most of the policy that directly affects city-regions, the federal parties still covet the metropolitan vote. How do the four major political parties stack up against one another on key urban issues?

Urban Policy Lab Graduate Fellow Sean McGowan provides a breakdown in this special election primer for the University of Toronto’s School of Cities.

Read the full post on the School of Cities website.

Applications open for 2021-22 UPL Graduate Fellowships

March 23, 2021 in News

UPL grad fellows

The Urban Policy Lab’s Graduate Fellows program offers Munk students interested in cities and urban policy the chance to participate in unique experiential learning opportunities, help coordinate the School’s urban-oriented extracurricular programming, and contribute to the Lab’s collaborative research, civic education, and outreach projects.

Eligibility and Financial Support

Up to four fellowships are available to second-year MPP or MGA students. Each fellowship comes with a $3,000 tuition bursary, in recognition of the time commitment involved (approx. 10-15 hours/week, September 2021 to April 2022).

Continue reading »

UPL graduate fellows produce podcast on support for main streets

January 11, 2021 in News

In partnership with Beyond the Headlines, the Munk School’s student-led current affairs show, UPL graduate fellows Sara Szot, Stephanie Bertolo, and Madison Leisk produced a podcast investigating supports for main streets and local economic recovery during the global pandemic.

Fellows sat down with Toronto City Councillor Brad Bradford, Ariana Holt, Senior Planner at the Canadian Urban Institute, and Jason Spicer, Assistant Professor in U of T’s Department of Geography and Planning to learn more.

Click here to listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts.

UPL Case Competition 2021

January 7, 2021 in Events

The UPL Case Competition is an annual case competition organized by and for graduate students. It challenges MPP and MGA students to analyze and solve a pressing urban policy issue by working in teams and presenting their solution to a distinguished panel of judges. The topic for this year’s case competition is community economic development on a street level. The case competition will be on January 22nd from 12-5pm.

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Apply now to be a UPL Graduate Fellow

August 7, 2020 in News

UPL grad fellows

The Urban Policy Graduate Fellows program is an initiative by the Urban Policy Lab that offers students interested in cities and urban policy at the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy the chance to participate in unique experiential learning opportunities, help coordinate the School’s urban-oriented extracurricular programming, and contribute to the Lab’s collaborative research, civic education, and outreach projects.

Eligibility and Financial Support

Up to four fellowships are available to second-year MPP or MGA students. Each fellowship comes with a $3,000 tuition bursary, in recognition of the time commitment involved (approx. 10-15 hours/week, September 2020 to April 2021).

Continue reading »

First look at Canadian Municipal Barometer 2020 survey results

April 12, 2020 in Projects

Canadian Municipal Barometer

The Urban Policy Lab is a proud partner in the Canadian Municipal Barometer project, which surveys more than 3,500 mayors and councillors across Canada to capture the pulse of local democracy.

Between April 3rd and April 17th, the Canadian Municipal Barometer asked mayors and councillors in municipalities across Canada how long they expect the negative consequences of the pandemic to last in their communities. The answers – from more than 550 mayors and councillors, across more than 300 municipalities – provide an insightful first look at what political leaders across Canada expect in the months to come.

For more information, including a first look at 2020 survey results, visit the Canadian Municipal Barometer website.

Recap: UPL Case Competition 2020

January 31, 2020 in Events

On January 24, more than 35 students participated in the 2020 edition of the Urban Policy Lab Case Competition, organized by UPL Graduate Fellow Josh Cho. Eight teams of students were tasked with developing an implementation strategy to advance transit-oriented development in Toronto that also addresses challenges with affordability, gentrification and buy-in from developers and local communities. Continue reading »

Recap: UPL Career and Skills Development Day 2020

January 20, 2020 in Events

On January 10th, the Urban Policy Lab hosted its second annual Career and Skills Development Day, a jam-packed schedule of interactive panels and small-group workshops to help MPP students gain specialized skills and knowledge relevant for a career in urban policy in multiple sectors and levels of government. UPL communications coordinators Kelly Husack and Kimberley Chan sat in on several sessions — a portion of over 11 hours of concurrent programming — and shared what they learned.

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UPL hosts inaugural Toronto Black Policy Conference

December 1, 2019 in Events

On Saturday, November 30, the Urban Policy Lab hosted the inaugural Toronto Black Policy Conference, in partnership with the City of Toronto’s Confronting Anti-Black Racism Unit. The first-of-its-kind event was organized by Munk School alumni Anna-Kay Russell, Sharnelle Morgan, and Eunice Kays, founders of the Toronto Black Policy Network. Continue reading »

Recap: Service Design for Municipalities

November 28, 2019 in Events

On October 11th, the Urban Policy Lab launched its interactive speaker series ‘Get Lunched!’ with a lesson on service design from Taylor Cook and Andrew Do from the City of Austin. UPL graduate fellow Jolene Funk, who organized and attended the event, shares what she learned from our guests. 

On October 11th, Taylor Cook and Andrew Do from the City of Austin came to the University of Toronto and led an interactive workshop on Service Design for Municipalities. The event was attended by Master of Public Policy Students and MPP alumni working in provincial and municipal governments.

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UPL sets out to measure local policy capacity in the GTHA

October 10, 2019 in Projects

It has long been presumed that local governments suffer from limited policy capacity compared to other orders of government. Yet few efforts have been made to empirically measure and test this assumption.

The Lab has begun a new research project, led by Prof. Gabriel Eidelman in collaboration with Prof. Daniel Henstra (University of Waterloo), to estimate policy capacity within the 30 local governments in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton area. Our goal is to calculate the extent of the municipal policy workforce, by identifying the number of practitioners responsible for policy research, analysis, evaluation, and advice, and assessing the prevalence and characteristics of policy work at the local level.

If you work for a GTHA municipality and wish to contribute to our research, be sure to contact us.

UPL launches Munk in the City 2019, federal election edition

September 25, 2019 in Events

Our Munk in the City initiative, now in its second year, invites students from the Munk School’s MPP and MGA programs to step out of the classroom and into the community, to explore and report on key election issues in each of Toronto’s 25 federal ridings.

This year’s edition kicked off with a civic engagement workshop led by Zahra Ebrahim (@zahraeb), an award-winning city builder and chair of Jane’s Walk, to prepare and inspire students to chronicle the city around them.

Follow our students’ adventures by looking out for the #munkinthecity hashtag across social media. A compilation of student submissions will be posted to the UPL website later this fall.

UPL joins Canadian Municipal Barometer partnership

September 10, 2019 in Projects

Canadian Municipal Barometer

The Canadian Municipal Barometer is a first-of-its-kind survey of mayors and councillors in more than 400 municipalities across Canada that will provide new insights for academic researchers, municipal policymakers, and the general public.

Supported by a SSHRC Partnership Development Grant, the project brings together academic researchers from across the country, the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, and the Samara Centre for Democracy, to generate high-quality data and rigorous analysis of Canadian municipal democracy and public policy.

The Urban Policy Lab will coordinate survey work for municipalities in Ontario, and work with the Samara Centre to publish an annual municipal democracy “checkup.” The first annual survey will be distributed in Spring 2020. Visit the project website to learn more and subscribe for updates.

Register now for Munk in the City 2019

September 9, 2019 in Events

In the weeks leading up to the federal election, 25 pairs of students from both the Master of Public Policy and Master of Global Affairs programs will step out of the classroom and into the community, venturing to all corners of the city to explore and report on key issues and concerns in each of Toronto’s 25 ridings.

For more information and to register, visit our events page.

Recap: Toronto Indigenous History Walking Tour

August 26, 2019 in Events

On August 12, the Urban Policy Lab arranged a walking tour for MPP students and alumni exploring the connections between public policy and Indigenous knowledge and history. UPL graduate fellow Jolene Funk organized the walk and shares her reflections on the experience.

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Recap: Applying Behavioural Insights in Cities

June 14, 2019 in Events

The field of behavioural science — the science of understanding, analyzing and motivating human behaviour — holds enormous potential to improve public policy and the delivery of public services. In recent years, behavioural insights derived from scientific knowledge and methods in the fields of psychology, cognitive/neuroscience, and economics have been applied by governments around the world. Most of these applications, however, have been limited to national and provincial contexts.

On June 5, the Urban Policy Lab co-hosted a half-day workshop for municipal practitioners from across the Greater Toronto and Hamilton region, in partnership with Behavioural Economics in Action at Rotman (BEAR) and the University of Toronto’s School of Cities.

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Reflections from CivicAction’s 2019 Canvas Summit

May 29, 2019 in Dispatches from the Field

On April 29, CivicAction held their quadrennial city summit, Canvas, which brought together nearly 1,200 civic leaders from all sectors to discuss solutions to pressing urban challenges in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton region. The UPL was an official event partner. Incoming 2019-20 UPL graduate fellow Jolene Funk attended the event and shares her reflections on the day’s conversations.

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Meet the 2019-20 Urban Policy Graduate Fellows

May 1, 2019 in News

The Urban Policy Lab is excited to announce the 2019-20 cohort of Urban Policy Graduate Fellows, a team of second-year Master of Public Policy students at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy who will contribute to the Lab’s education, research, and outreach projects.

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