Become a Landscape Architect

ASLA 2014 Student Communications Honor Award. SNACKs. Danielle Alexander, Associate ASLA; Nicholas Knodt, graduate. Faculty Advisors: Ghazal Abbasy-Asbagh, Inaki Alday, Robin Dripps, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA / Danielle Alexander

LAAB Annual Report Summaries

Programs accredited by LAAB are required to submit reports each year providing information about the program's students, graduates, budgets, and faculty among other items. This information allows LAAB to monitor significant changes and compliance with accreditation standards. Additionally, aggregate data from the reports is used to track trends in landscape architecture education and to communicate those trends with our communities of interest. Below are the Annual Report Summaries comprised by LAAB from the 2013, 2014, and 2015 Annual Reports. Also, a summary is provided to show the data trends over the three years.

LAAB 2016 Annual Report Summary
LAAB 2015 Annual Report Summary
LAAB 2014 Annual Report Summary
LAAB 2013 Annual Report Summary
2013-2015 Summary Sheet

As a recognized accrediting agency by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation, Landscape Architectural Accreditation Board (LAAB) is required to conduct a comprehensive review of its standards on a periodic basis. LAAB conducts a formal, comprehensive review of the accreditation standards every five (5) years (page 4, LAAB PROCEDURES). LAAB last approved revisions to the standards in 2010, which were subsequently revised Spring 2013.

During the past year, members of LAAB have been working to revise and update the STANDARDS & PROCEDURES by which they evaluate and accredit professional education programs in landscape architecture. These efforts started in fall 2014, with a call for comment and input among members of the “community of interest” (persons interested in professional landscape architectural education). The Board received comments, suggestions, and recommendations for improving the STANDARDS & PROCEDURES from almost 60 persons. The Board reviewed those comments, explored trends in professional accreditation policy, and its experiences with recent reviews. Based on work sessions of the Board and the efforts of an editing committee, the Board has developed and published the LAAB 2016 ACCREDITATION STANDARDS and LAAB 2016 ACCREDITATION PROCEDURES.

The revised standards will be in effect starting with programs scheduled for accreditation reviews in fall 2017. The revised procedures are effective immediately.

LAAB Conducts Annual Report Webinar 
 
LAAB Accreditation Manager, Kristopher Pritchard, conducted a webinar covering topics related to the LAAB Annual Report on Thursday, March 10, 2016. This webinar covered topics such as logging on to CiviCore, the online platform hosting the annual reports; clarification in faculty counts; clarification on updating Recommendations from previous reviews; and other best practices for programs submitting data. For those who were unable to attend the webinar, a recording of the LAAB 2016 Annual Report Webinar is available on LAAB's Website. Additionally, a recording of last year's LAAB 2015 Annual Report Webinar is still available.