location_cityY-PLAN
Oakland, California

Y-PLAN is a best-practice model of public participation. It isn’t just contributing to a specific project; it’s transforming the process. / Oakland City Manager
The Center for Cities + Schools is building on two decades of partnership with the Oakland Unified School District and the City of Oakland. During that time, Y-PLAN Oakland has partnered planners from the City of Oakland’s Planning and Building department, Chief Resilience Officer, BART and AC Transit, Sustainability Director, Oakland Housing Authority, and more with classrooms at ten different Oakland Unified School District elementary and high schools.
Classes ranging from AP Environmental Science to Sustainable Systems to Manhood Development, in Pathways from the Green to Law and Social Justice, have engaged students on authentic city planning projects, supporting them as they leverage their lived experiences and content knowledge to propose recommendations for a healthier, more equitable, resilient, and joyful Oakland.
Y-PLAN provided a means for me to achieve the large-scale, project-based learning that I have been striving for. It offered me an opportunity to push skills like teamwork and collaboration that are hard to make truly authentic in a classroom assignment. / Oakland Teacher
Oakland: 20 Years


Why are we on a gentrification tour? Why are we focusing on Downtown Oakland when it is already nice? Can this money be used in other neighborhoods in Oakland—like mine? / Student from Oakland MetWest High School
Y-PLAN students learn to ask "Why? Why do things look a certain way in one part of the city but entirely different across town? Why are resources so unfairly divided?"

Oakland, California

