The goal of the Landscape Architecture Program at UC Davis is to increase the quality of life through the development and preservation of landscape design and planning processes that are meaningful, relevant and sustainable: meaningful in that they reinforce sense of self, sense of place, and sense of community relevant in that they provide solutions to environmental problems rather than contributing to them sustainable in that they embody long-term, permanently beneficial relationship between human culture and the physical/natural environment. Through our research and our teaching facilities, as well as through innovative landscape design and planning, we aim to provide individuals with a means of making positive connections between their personal lives and the environment in which they live. The practice of landscape architecture incorporates knowledge and methods from the arts and humanities, the environmental sciences and the social sciences. The landscape architecture faculty at UC Davis represents a range of interests and expertise, appropriate to the broad scope of the profession. Faculty research is linked by a shared focus on knowledge, issues and technologies affecting the practice of landscape architecture. Research in landscape architecture at UC Davis falls into three main areas of investigation: history and theory of the built environment environmental restoration, planning, policy and management social and cultural issues in landscape design In the current context of rapid environmental change, research and teaching programs are directed towards developing innovative solutions to urgent, contemporary, environmental problems such as urban sprawl, land-use conflicts, dwindling open space, deteriorating neighborhoods and diminishing sense of community. by Alexa Callison-Burch