Assistant Professor, Urban Analytics

About the Role

The Department of Urban Planning and Community Development (UPCD) in the School for the Environment at the University of Massachusetts Boston (UMB) invites applications for a full-time, tenure-track Assistant Professor position in Urban Analytics and Artificial Intelligence (AI) beginning September 1, 2027.

Position Overview

We seek scholars whose research and teaching integrate urban planning, computational methods, and artificial intelligence to examine complex challenges facing communities, cities, and regions. The successful candidate will contribute to planning scholarship and practice through community-engaged and innovative applications of urban analytics and AI that support more equitable, inclusive, and sustainable communities, cities, and regions.

We seek candidates with expertise in Urban Analytics, broadly defined as the application of computational, statistical, and spatial methods to urban systems and planning challenges. Candidates should demonstrate the ability to bridge technical methods and planning practice, with a focus on addressing inequities and sustainability challenges in communities, cities and regions.

Substantive areas of interest include, but are not limited to:

• Climate, Public, and Municipal Finance (e.g., budget modeling, infrastructure finance, fiscal analytics)
• Transportation and Mobility Systems (e.g., accessibility modeling, intelligent transportation systems, equity in mobility and access)
• Environmental Planning and Urban Resilience (e.g., climate modeling, environmental justice analytics, risk assessment)
• Land Use, Zoning, and Urban Development (e.g., zoning and entitlement analysis, land-use change, development patterns, spatial modeling, growth management)

We are particularly interested in candidates whose work critically engages how data and AI can both reproduce and mitigate structural inequities in urban systems.

Key Responsibilities

• Develop and sustain an independent, externally funded research program in urban analytics or a related field.
• Publish in high-impact, peer-reviewed journals.
• Engage in collaborative, interdisciplinary research across the School for the Environment and the broader university, with a focus on advancing equity, and justice.
• Teach core and elective courses in the BA and MS programs, including urban analytics, GIS and spatial analysis, and AI applications in urban systems.
• Mentor undergraduate and graduate students through advising, research supervision, and career development.
• Participate in departmental, college, and university governance.
• Engage with community partners and public and nonprofit sectors.
• Contribute to UPCD’s mission of community-engaged and practice-oriented planning education.
• Collaborate with campus initiatives such as the Paul English Applied AI Institute, the Urban Harbors Institute, the Sustainable Solutions Lab, and other centers across the university.

Requirements & Tech Stack

• Expertise in Urban Analytics
• Expertise in Artificial Intelligence (AI)
• Experience with computational methods
• Experience with statistical methods
• Experience with spatial methods
• Experience with GIS and spatial analysis
• Experience with data visualization
• Experience with computational modeling

Qualifications

• A Ph.D. degree in Urban Planning or a closely related field by the start date.
• For candidates whose Ph.D. is outside of Urban Planning, a master’s degree in Urban Planning from a PAB-accredited program is preferred.
• Evidence of scholarly research and publication potential in urban planning, including demonstrated engagement with computational modeling, AI, and data visualization, alongside other appropriate methodological approaches.
• Demonstrated ability or potential to teach in areas related to urban analytics and computational methods integrating AI.
• Evidence of or potential for external research funding.

Approximate Salary Range: $80,000 - $98,003