TRACK 10 EDUCATION: in the face of uncertainty and complexity 
Taher Abdel-Ghani (October University for Modern Sciences and Arts, Egypt)
Andrea Frank (University of Birmingham, United Kingdom)
David Leonard Knapp (University of Tartu, Estonia)
 
Planning education can be interpreted in multiple, yet related ways. On one hand education for and in the spatial planning field, i.e. preparing future planning practitioners to cope with the complexities and uncertainties to be addressed in spatial development. How can we create curricula and courses that help students cope with (super)complexity? What teaching and learning formats and pedagogies might support the development of skills, knowledge and values that would enable practitioners to effectively deal with these challenges? What will be the future format of planning education, a field that has been reluctant to embrace distance and online learning until forced by the COVID19 pandemic. How do institutions and planning educators plan for hybrid/adaptive teaching in an uncertain future for the HE sector and attract diverse students asserting preferences and learning needs? Can we teach spatial planning without spatial and physical presence? On the other hand, there is planning education(onal infrastructure) as a function that needs to be spatially allocated and provided for in our cities and settlements. This has to date not been a focus in planning. Again uncertainties and complexities exist. Education is important, because access to educational opportunities affects social mobility through the distribution of educational attainment and labour market opportunities. Meanwhile, residential segregation often translates into school segregation through allocation of school catchments. This can be mitigated or exacerbated through the implementation of allocation methods and policies, such as academic tracking and lotteries, as well as parental preferences. Therefore, if efforts of planners to avoid segregation between socio-demographic groups are to be successful, it is increasingly important that planning professionals and researchers understand how education policies interact with other planning areas, especially housing. Overlaps of the two themes of education in planning and planning for educational attainment and infrastructure exist in that planning educators may want to involve youth/pupils and schools or consider the multifunctionality of educational infrastructure in urban development. 
 
As such, this track invites theoretical, methodological and empirical contributions that explore: (a) "education in and for spatial planning" disseminating novel approaches in teaching and learning to prepare future planning and education and spatial planning (looking at higher education, continued further education and possibly pre-initial education) or (b) "planning for educational infrastructure" (school allocation, demographic change/segregation, student neighbourhoods and studentification, transport needs in relation to education) as well as any linked studies. 
 
Keywords: Planning education, pedagogy, planning curricula, educational infrastructure, schools, segregation, access, educational inequality, access to education.