astronomy

School of Cities

School of Cities is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand School of Cities rather than just read about it. In short: The School of Cities is a research centre dedicated to urban study and education at the University of Toronto. The centre is an extra-departmental unit (EDU) composed of faculty from the university's three campuses and visiting professors from other institutions, with the goal of consolidating urban-focused academics from various divisions, such as Engineering, Architecture, and Public Health.

Key takeaways

School of Cities belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect School of Cities to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of School of Cities from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The School of Cities is a research centre dedicated to urban study and education at the University of Toronto. The centre is an extra-departmental unit (EDU) composed of faculty from the university's three campuses and visiting professors from other institutions, with the goal of consolidating urban-focused academics from various divisions, such as Engineering, Architecture, and Public Health. The centre is directed by Karen Chapple, a professor of urban planning in the Department of Geography and Planning who also holds the Carmel P. Friesen Chair in Urban Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. It is based in the Myhal Centre for Engineering Innovation and Entrepreneurship on the St. George campus in downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Research

The School of Cities was established on July 1, 2018, by the Faculty of Arts and Science Council after three years of planning, with a starting budget of approximately $2 million. Apart from Arts and Science, its interdisciplinary faculty draw from U of T's Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering, John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design, Rotman School of Management, U of T Mississauga, and U of T Scarborough. Since then it has conducted research at the centre of urban growth in the Greater Toronto Area and informs policy in public sectors. Toronto's recent growth and development going into the twenty-first century has made it the fifth-largest urban area in North America. It publishes regular reports and interactive tools for data visualization based on statistics gathered from the city and the Greater Toronto Area in metrics such as economics, housing, density, and climate. Affiliated faculty have been interviewed as experts on topics such as the cost of home-owning in Canada and the planned Alto high-speed rail project. The School of Cities hosts several urban- and urban planning-related undergraduate courses at the University of Toronto and offers fellowships for postgraduate students.

Centres and collaborations The centre works on and is affiliated with several interdisciplinary initiatives. These include:

Infrastructure Institute Institute on Municipal Finance & Governance Housing Justice Lab Urban Policy Lab (in partnership with the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy) Urban Data Research Centre Mobility Network Creative Communities Commons In 2021, the School of Cities and United Way Greater Toronto partnered to establish a Leading Social Justice Fellowship to address social justice issues in the community.

Affiliated researchers The following is a list of notable academic staff of the University of Toronto formally affiliated with the School of Cities.

Jeffrey Ansloos Karen Chapple Richard Florida Marc T. J. Johnson Marieme Lo

References

External links Official website

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with School of Cities

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what School of Cities claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to School of Cities before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about School of Cities ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of School of Cities

In research: School of Cities appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses School of Cities in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: School of Cities is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 2018 establishments in Ontario, Extra-departmental units of the University of Toronto, University of Toronto Faculty of Arts and Science, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for School of Cities outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study School of Cities in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what School of Cities means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain School of Cities out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is School of Cities in simple terms?

Why does School of Cities matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study School of Cities?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on School of Cities.