Masters in Landscape Architecture

The Master of Landscape Architecture at the University of Georgia’s College of Environment and Design combines design education with practical skills, technical training, and hands-on community engagement. Students work in dedicated graduate studios and lab spaces, use digital and visualization resources, and participate in service-learning projects that connect landscape design with real community, environmental, and public-sector challenges. The program also provides opportunities for field-based learning, professional exposure, and interdisciplinary research through UGA’s landscape architecture and environmental research ecosystem.

Key experiential learning opportunities include:

• Graduate design studios: Students in the MLA work in dedicated graduate studio spaces in Denmark Hall, which also contains lecture classrooms and laboratory spaces shared by the MLA and other CED graduate programs.
• Service-learning projects: The MLA incorporates immersive service-learning projects in which students engage directly with communities and develop solutions addressing health, safety, environmental, and community needs.
• Digital and computer facilities: CED provides computer lab facilities within its academic buildings, supporting the digital production and representation work required in landscape architecture education.
• Virtual reality: The REDLab (VR) in the Jackson Street Building provides a dedicated environment for virtual-reality-based exploration and visualization within CED.
• Field-based learning: UGA’s MLA offerings include field instruction such as Jekyll Island En Plein Air – Watercolor & Sketching, where students practice outdoor drawing, perspective, value mapping, scale, proportion, and watercolor techniques for design representation.
• Professional field trips: A UGA MLA course includes travel through Los Angeles and San Francisco, with visits to landscape architecture projects such as urban developments, parks, greenways, national parks, botanical gardens, arboreta, and memorials. Students also visit six to eight professional offices to observe practice and make professional contacts.
• Research laboratories: Students can engage with UGA’s Sustainability and Landscape Performance Lab, where research includes green infrastructure, sustainable site design, native plant communities, and landscape performance.
• Natural infrastructure research: The Institute for Resilient Infrastructure Systems (IRIS) provides interdisciplinary research opportunities; a UGA MLA student has worked with Ducks Unlimited on wetland habitat surveys and habitat-change modeling in the South Carolina Lowcountry.
• Founders Memorial Garden: The 2.5-acre Founders Memorial Garden functions as a learning laboratory and teaching resource, containing more than 300 species of plant material and providing a real landscape for observation and study.
• Library and resource facilities: The Owens Resource Center/Owens Library is housed within the CED’s Jackson Street Building and supports students with landscape architecture resources and research materials.
• Gallery and design presentations: The Circle Gallery provides a venue for exhibitions by students, faculty, alumni, and visiting designers, creating opportunities to see and discuss landscape and environmental design work.
• Interdisciplinary opportunities: MLA students can connect their landscape architecture studies with areas such as environmental planning, historic preservation, environmental ethics, and Native American Studies, including a combined MLA and Native American Studies certificate pathway.
• Internships: The MLA program notes that many summer internships provide stipends, giving students an opportunity to gain professional experience while helping offset living expenses.
• Research and scholarly projects: Students can develop independent scholarly work in landscape architecture, with UGA’s Open Scholar repository documenting MLA research on topics such as green infrastructure, watershed management, stormwater control, and healing-garden design.

The Master of Landscape Architecture (MLA) at the University of Georgia prepares graduates for professional careers across private practice, public-sector planning, landscape design, research, and related environmental fields. UGA’s official 2024 MLA career outcomes show that 100% of responding graduates were employed full-time, with graduates moving into roles such as Landscape Architect, Landscape Designer, Landscape Architecture Analyst, and Planner.

Typical career roles: Landscape Architect, Landscape Designer, Landscape Architecture Analyst, Planner

Career development and progression opportunities include:

• Career services: The UGA Career Center provides graduate students with career advising and employment resources, while the College of Environment + Design specifically directs MLA students toward career services, internships, and employment opportunities.
• Employment outcomes: For the 2024 MLA graduating class, UGA reported 12 respondents, with all 12 employed full-time (100%). Reported employers included Breedlove Land Planning, Kimley-Horn, Smallwood, Surface 678, SPG Planners + Engineers, and Site Solutions Landscape Architects.
• Salary outcomes: Among the six 2024 MLA graduates who reported salary information, the median salary was $56,000, with a reported range of $52,000–$70,000. UGA notes that the salary figures represent only those graduates who reported salary information.
• Industry connections: Students gain professional exposure through service-learning and community-based design projects, and recent MLA internships have taken students to firms and organizations across the U.S. and internationally, including locations in Colorado, California, Washington, New York, Virginia, India, and China.
• Professional practice network: UGA’s official graduate outcomes identify employers such as Kimley-Horn, Breedlove Land Planning, EMC Engineering Services, JMorton Planning & Landscape Architecture, Mundus Bishop, Osgood Landscape Architecture, Site Solutions Landscape Architects, and Surface 678, demonstrating the range of professional environments reached by MLA graduates.
• Accreditation value: The MLA is accredited by the Landscape Architectural Accreditation Board (LAAB), and UGA confirms that all MLA program tracks are included in the accreditation. This provides an important professional foundation for graduates pursuing landscape architecture licensure and long-term practice.
• STEM designation: UGA’s MLA has been recognized as an official STEM discipline by the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia, reflecting the program’s integration of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics into landscape architecture education.
• Graduation outcomes: UGA’s longer-term MLA employment data show graduates working across private practice, public practice, landscape horticulture/design-build, advanced study/research, and teaching. In the program’s 2014–2019 records, 59% were in private practice and 7% in public practice, while 4.5% were in advanced study/research and 3.4% in teaching.
• Professional reputation: UGA’s College of Environment + Design has reported strong national recognition for its landscape architecture programs; in one DesignIntelligence ranking cited by UGA, the MLA ranked fourth nationally in Healthy Built Environments and placed in the top five across 11 of 12 focus categories.

Further Academic Progression: After completing the MLA, students can continue into advanced research and academic pathways, including doctoral-level study. Within UGA’s College of Environment + Design, graduates can also pursue related graduate study in areas such as Historic Preservation and Urban Planning and Design, while MLA students can deepen their specialization through graduate certificates in Environmental Ethics, Historic Preservation Studies, and Cultural Landscape Conservation.