Faculty Profile
Margaret Bryant

Associate Professor

423 Marshall Hall

[email protected]
315-470-4929

Education

• Ph.D. in Regional Planning, University of Massachusetts Amherst
• Master of Landscape Architecture, University of Georgia
• Bachelor of Science, Horticulture, Mississippi State University

CCRD

Center for Community and Regional Design

My Praxis

“praxis: reflection and action upon the world in order to transform it”

Friere, 1970

For over three decades, I have committed myself to the education of future professionals in landscape architecture and physical planning (land use and environmental). Through community-based studio courses and applied research, I maintained a connection to professional practice, which has been my own form of experiential learning. My praxis involves reflecting on the meaning of what can be learned through practice, through working with affected communities, and the iterative cycles of doing, reflecting, and adapting. In my current role as Executive Director of the Center for Community and Regional Design (CCRD), I have the opportunity to bring this reflective practice to bear on the critical issues facing Central New York, extending the impact of the College on the region, and to develop innovative strategies for interdisciplinary education.

From 2022 to 2026, I served as Department Chair during a challenging transition for our programs. In that role, I emphasized my commitment to landscape architecture students, praxis, and the value of landscape architecture more broadly as a vehicle for transdisciplinary problem solving. I led the department through a physical transition back to campus from an off-campus surge space following the gut renovation of our building, a successful LAAB accreditation, a faculty retirement wave that resulted in 60% of the department’s faculty being replaced over four years, and a change in the BLA program from five years to four. I especially enjoyed meeting prospective students and their families, choosing to personally lead all our recruitment sessions. My proudest accomplishment beyond service to current students was increasing undergraduate enrollment by 70% between 2022 and 2026, with first-year enrollment increasing more than 75%.

Area of Specialization

I have a passion for land. In more specific terms, I am passionate about land and water resources and about helping people make better decisions about their use. I act on this passion in two ways: (1) conducting research and outreach in land use/landscape planning and (2) teaching future planners and designers about ecological systems and the associated complexities inherent in decisions about use and management.

Both rural and urban land use questions interest me. Specifically, I am interested in the interplay between ecological systems and the built environment and in the land management decisions of local governments. Land use conflicts create demand for innovative planning and design, and cities and their associated regions are contested spaces whose importance is only increasing as urbanization rapidly expands around the globe. I have conducted research in the areas of urban biodiversity; remnant urban green space and its use for improving water quality and for providing neighborhood amenities; neighborhood determinants of health; alternative futures analyses; and ecologically sensitive, conservation-oriented, land planning and management.

Motivation for my work as a landscape architecture educator comes from the concepts of “the site speaks first” and “site as source,” a respect for the land itself, hydrological systems, and the complexities of socio-ecological systems. Reading the landscape is a fundamental skill of the profession, and I enjoy the process of helping students see the landscape in ways that they haven’t before, in ways that lead to informed, responsible, and poetic design responses. Like the botanist who can travel the world and recognize genera or families of plants even if a particular species is new to them, the landscape architect can use their skills to analyze and understand biophysical systems wherever they encounter them. In studio classes, we practice these skills, using them to discover patterns in large landscapes and then relating the patterns to opportunities for planning and design interventions at the site scale. My portfolio includes many collaborations with planning agencies and environmental organizations that need such analyses as part of their planning and design processes. Real world needs are brought into classes so that students and practitioners both benefit.

My research interests include questions about how people process landscape data and how data is used to make decisions about public and private investments in our communities. Plan making as an expression of the social construction of knowledge is an interest I have pursued over the length of my career, primarily as a person involved in the creation of plans. My work bridges landscape architecture and urban and regional planning, an area of expertise that I call landscape planning.

Teaching Experience

• SUNY College of Environmental Science & Forestry (2007-Present)
• Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (8 years)

Practice Experience

• Jordan, Jones & Goulding, Inc – Environmental/Land Use Planning
• Pioneer Valley Planning Commission - Environmental/Land Use Planning
• METLAND Landscape Planning Group – Planning Research and Outreach
• Institute for Community and Area Development – Planning Research and Outreach

Courses Taught

• LSA 326 Landscape Design Studio I
• LSA 321 Ecological Applications in Planning and Design
• LSA 470/670 – Thematic Landscape Design Studio
• LSA 496/696 – Community Mapping and GIS
• Seminars: Community Development Process, Shaping Cities

Teaching and Research Interests

• Ecologically-based physical planning and design
• Landscape/land use planning, including conservation land planning
• Environmental determinants of health
• Neighborhood-scale planning

Professional Reports

Bryant, M.M. and Carolyn Copenhaver. 2021. A Fresh Look at the Salmon River Corridor: Oswego County, New York. Report submitted to NYS Department of Environmental Conservation. 94 pages.

Bryant, M.M. 2019. Public Engagement in a Time of Change: A Scoping Study for the Central Pine Barrens. Report submitted to Central Pine Barrens Joint Planning & Policy Commission. 49 pages.

Bryant, M.M. 2016. Common Ground Jackson. Report submitted to Downtown Jackson Partners, Jackson, Mississippi. 200 pages.

Grohol, E. and M.M. Bryant. 2015. Chancellorsville at a Crossroads. Report submitted to the National Park Service Olmsted Center for Landscape Preservation and the Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania National Military Park, Fredericksburg, Virginia. 166 pages.

Bryant, M.M. and K. Van Der Geest. 2014. Think Like a Watershed: The Nine Mile Creek Watershed Planning Project. Report submitted to the Nine Mile Creek Conservation Council, Liverpool, New York. 140 pages.

Selected Publications

Bryant, M.M. 2019. From Thermodynamics to Creativity: McHarg’s Ecological Planning Theory and Its Implications For Resilience Planning and Adaptive Design. Socio-Ecological Practice Research. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42532-019-00027-1

Bryant, M.M. 2019. Boom and Decline: When Greenways Link Low and High SES Neighborhoods. Paper. Proceedings of the Fábos Conference on Landscape and Greenway Planning 6: 3. https://scholarworks.umass.edu/fabos/vol6/iss1/3/

Bryant, M.M. 2011. Climate Adaptation: A Research Agenda for Landscape Architects. Proceedings: CELA 2011 Urban Nature: 769 - 781. Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture (www.thecela.org).

Bryant, M.M. 2009. Urban Green Infrastructure, Public Health, and Local Government: Lessons Learned From Long-Term Engagement With One American City. Proceedings: CELA 2008-2009 Teaching + Learning Landscape: 175-178. Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture (www.thecela.org).

Bryant, M.M. 2006. Urban Landscape Conservation and the Role of Ecological Greenways at Local and Metropolitan Scales. Landscape and Urban Planning 76: 23-44. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2004.09.029

Musacchio, L., E. Ordenerol, M.M. Bryant, and T. Evans. 2005. Changing Landscapes, Changing Disciplines: Seeking to Understand Interdisciplinarity in Landscape Ecological Change Research. Landscape and Urban Planning 73: 326-338. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2004.08.003