Interview Series: Bridging Academia and Practice

An Interview with Paul Kissinger, FASLA, PLA

by Sara Hadavi, PhD, ASLA

As the landscape architecture profession continues to evolve, the exchange of knowledge between long-term practice and academic settings becomes increasingly valuable. Practitioners who step into teaching roles mid-career or later in their professional journeys bring not only technical expertise but also perspective shaped by decades of experience navigating complex projects, clients, and changing disciplinary priorities. Their contributions can help ground design education in the realities of practice while also encouraging critical reflection on how the profession has transformed over time.

This interview series by the ASLA Education & Practice Working Group continues to explore these intersections by featuring voices across different career stages and trajectories. By sharing firsthand experiences, the series aims to illuminate diverse pathways into teaching and offer insight into how practitioners can meaningfully engage with academic programs.

In this third interview, we are pleased to feature Paul Kissinger, FASLA, PLA, who brings a distinguished career in practice through his work with EDSA and Kissinger Design to his experience in landscape architecture education at the University of Michigan.

Paul Kissinger, FASLA, PLA

Can you briefly describe your professional journey in landscape architecture and what led you to transition into teaching?

After finishing graduate school at Kansas State University, I was fortunate to be recruited by EDSA and stayed there for 31 years. I worked my way up through the ranks, from design staff to senior principal, board member, chief operating officer, and studio leader. I was fortunate to work on a broad range of public and private projects across the world. After leaving Fort Lauderdale and EDSA and moving to Michigan, I knew that I was not done with the profession, so I started to examine other opportunities. I opened up my own planning, landscape architecture, and urban design firm and now have found time to give back through volunteering more at National ASLA. In addition, as I live near the University of Michigan, I reached out to the program and was fortunate that they had a need for an instructor with my skill sets.

How has your practice in landscape architecture shaped your approach to teaching?

The studio experience at my firm was instrumental in my approach to teaching. During my career at EDSA, I worked with a multitude of entry level landscape designers and mentored and taught them about the profession. It was a very enjoyable part of my career, and I was able to work in a team with great people and accomplish great things.

Was teaching something you had always considered, or did it emerge organically?

Candidly, it was not something that I considered at all. I had taught a class many years ago (Site Engineering for Architects); it was an undergraduate class with 70 students. The reason I was asked to teach was because the professor that typically taught the class was getting busy with the department's quasi-consulting organization and had taught the class for many years. It was a volunteer effort, and I spent the semester being about 1-2 lectures ahead of the class. It was not the best of experiences, unfortunately. I was introduced to grade inflation in the educational system. The students' grades attained a bell curve with a C as the median, but since they needed a C+ to pass the class, the professor that recorded the grades bumped everyone up a half grade.

What have been the most surprising or challenging aspects of transitioning from practice to education?

I was very fortunate to work with some of the best and brightest young landscape designers at EDSA. They were motivated, wanted to learn about the profession, were enthusiastic, and ultimately it was a paying job. At the University, I have to remember that all the students may not have the same level of motivation and enthusiasm, and they are typically paying a tremendous amount of tuition, which simply adds to the pressure cooker of graduate school. Grades are highly important for a variety of reasons, including financial aid, which in my opinion just adds stress and may have a negative impact on the learning process. In addition, things move very slowly in education, and I never really thought about higher education as a business, but it clearly is, and that brings a whole other set of parameters into the process. While I understood departments or specializations needed to be fiscally responsible and recruiting appropriate sizes of classes was necessary, I had not really thought much about the business of education much before getting into teaching.

Probably the pace at which educational system moves has been the most surprising in this transition. In addition, at times, the work ethic of the students has been surprising. Though to be fair, with the high cost of tuition, most, if not all the students have to juggle a part-time job or work-study or teaching assistant position that adds to their responsibilities, on top of going into debt due to having to get financial aid for tuition. It really is a recipe for pressure. In addition, the governance at the school is very different from other organizations I have been involved with. The University has a horizontal management system. As a lecturer in the landscape architecture department (part-time), I report to Assistant Dean of the school who is not a landscape architect. However, as landscape architecture is a specialization, the landscape architecture faculty does meet regularly to discuss program and curriculum topics.

Site visit in Halong Bay, Vietnam

What were your initial expectations about teaching? How did the reality compare?

As the profession is so broad, the students come to the program with a very diverse sense of what the profession is about, which was to be expected. However, since the rise in tuition costs, I believe that some of the students come into the program with one expectation of what they need to learn, without really knowing what the profession is all about. In addition, I was probably a bit naïve about how the students and educational system has evolved, since my graduate school education was nearly 40 years ago. My first experience was co-teaching a professional practice class that was taught over Zoom. Zoom classes are very different than in-person lectures or professional meetings over Zoom. Having started after Covid, and with the rise in tuition, some of the students, especially ones that came from a non-design field, had no idea about what it took to do studio work, and the work ethic in some of the students was very different from what I expected. Additionally, since Covid, there tends to be a lot of flexibility related to deadlines, which I think can set an unrealistic expectation for when they get into the work world.

What is your teaching load and how do you balance your time and energy between professional work and your academic responsibilities?

In the Fall I teach Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 9:00 - 11:20 and in the Winter, I teach Tuesdays from 9:00 - 11:20. I am semi-retired, so it has not conflicted with my consulting work. However, if I was working full time, there would be no way I would be able to do both. It was a conscious decision of mine, although somewhat organic, to get into teaching.

How do you sustain your creative energy across both domains of practice and teaching?

This part, I think, is easy, as in the Fall I teach a site planning and design class, so the entire semester is about design, teaching about design through studio projects, and design reviews. Some of the consulting work I am doing is more in the urban design field, as well as strategic advising to real estate developers along with some small-scale planning work. I spent over three decades working at full speed at a large international planning, landscape architecture, and urban design firm, and the change of pace has been nice and has allowed me to shift my focus in the profession.

From your perspective, what are the most significant gaps between landscape architecture education and professional practice?

I think this varies from program to program. Looking through my private practice lens and experience with hiring entry level designers from a multitude of programs, I think the programs do not provide enough studio classes and working at a variety of scales. Additionally, I think most students do not come to the workplace with much of an understanding of detailed design, or design process. One of the challenges that our profession faces, and I don't really think it is getting much airtime, is how the tools and technology of profession are getting increasingly complex, and the academic programs have little to no ability to teach the complex software programs needed to enter the profession these days. Just teaching the foundational skills for an entry level landscape designer keeps the students and faculty busy enough.

What skills, knowledge areas, or habits do students often lack when they enter the profession?

Again, this is different from program to program, but some of the programs expect the students to learn AutoCAD on their own, yet the students rarely have any drafting experience. Learning a drafting program without any experience in simple drafting makes the learning curve that much steeper. As mentioned above, I think there are more opportunities for more design studios during the program and being exposed to more scales of work. Also, with the advent of AutoCAD, Civil 3D, SketchUp, Revit, Rhino, Grasshopper, etc., students are working on laptops typically, and do not advance their hand drawing abilities. With the constantly zooming in and out that is necessary on a small laptop screen, students are challenged in developing their skills related to the scale of spaces. When drawing by hand, this skill, I believe, is easier to hone.

Prep meeting for client meeting in Dalian, China

How have you tried to address these gaps in your own teaching?

In my site planning and design class, I spend time during the class talking about workflow and how to manage your time and get the work done. I also spend time on design process related to the project and assignment. We spend time on hand graphic techniques, graphics and drafting shortcuts to save time on production, so that they can spend more time on design. In professional practice class, we talk more about the business of landscape architecture, and I go through in much more detail the planning process, time management, organizational structures of firms, demographics of the profession, the CLARB Job Task Analysis, as the students are continuing to develop their understanding of the profession.

As I don't currently teach a construction class, I am not able to really address all of the concerns or gaps, but as someone that has been fortunate enough to get a lot of projects built, I try to inject in the design process questions and thoughts about how things come together and have added a schematic design portion to my studio class.

You mentioned that you teach site planning and design as professional practice. How do you bring real-world experiences and constraints into your classroom or studio?

In the site planning and design class, I have selected a real site that we can all easily visit. I have them do a site analysis and master plan starting with bubble diagrams and then conceptual master plan. They present their work to visiting reviewers, and they move onto schematic design for the last third or so of the semester. The scale of the project has them work between several scales, from 200 scale down to 1" = 5' throughout the semester. This provides the students an opportunity to learn and think about land uses and adjacencies, down to materials and details during a schematic design phase for the last third of the semester.

In professional practice, I am fortunate to bring my nearly 40 years of experience in the private sector to class. The goal of the class is to provide the students with a background in the depth of landscape architectural practice, the business of landscape architecture, and an introduction to contracts and construction-related services. I bring in several professionals that are guest speakers from various segments of the profession and expose the students to various career examples, sectors of the profession, and what it takes to work in an office compared to being in academics.

How receptive are students to learning from someone whose primary background is practice rather than academia?

A mixed bag, candidly-hard to say and difficult to gauge. However, I do believe that the other faculty are very receptive and appreciative of what I bring to the department.

Can you share a specific teaching strategy or project that helped connect students to professional realities?

As a lecturer (adjunct faculty), I am in the studio class for the duration of the studio time. Like in an office, I circulate amongst the students to check on progress and answer questions, and I'm readily available in class as well as out of class. I do my best to provide specific requirements of a project like a scope, but do not provide a checklist of things the students need to accomplish, as in practice, it is about the critical thinking necessary to complete a project. I work on time management strategies to produce the work (production), as well as assisting them think through what they need to do to accomplish the work through story boarding, as we would do in an office.

In your view, what unique value do professional instructors bring to landscape architecture programs?

Now as part of my career has included teaching, I have had the opportunity to be more informed about the accreditation process. One of the tidbits I picked up is that professional instructors, or adjuncts / lecturers are invaluable to the profession. The number of part time instructors in the profession is staggering as compared to full time faculty members. From the 2024 Landscape Architectural Accreditation Board (LAAB) Annual Report, there are 1,158 faculty members, with 468 tenured faculty and 690 non-tenured faculty. Of the non-tenured faculty, 516 are part-time, which leads me to believe that possibly around 45% of the overall faculty are teaching and in private practice. My observation of this data suggests that many of the programs are underfunded for faculty salaries. My guess is that it may have something to do with the ratio of the University's cost of the facility space / desks and number of students. Studio space is much different than a lecture hall that may hold several hundred students and one faculty member. Thus, some departments are forced to come up with less expensive solutions to round out faculty. Some programs do not have this issue, but the numbers from LAAB, in my opinion, are very eye-opening. If this trend continues, as faculty retire, there may be an even larger need for part-time adjunct professors / lecturers.

I believe that instructors from the private sector bring a dose of reality and practicality to the classroom about what is currently going on in the profession. One of the things that I have learned over the years, as faculty members are pushed to do more research and bring in dollars to the school, is that the faculty are going to research what is interesting to them. If they have not practiced for a while, then the disconnect between practice and the academy continues to broaden. This has been a topic for discussion in our profession for years. As a result, there are more private firms starting to do their own research, generally larger firms. Professional instructors bring to the program, typically, more of the reality of how landscape architecture is being practiced currently.

What institutional support, or lack thereof, have you encountered as a practicing instructor?

There was absolutely no on-boarding at the University. No orientation to teaching, or the University policies and procedures. I basically showed up and taught my classes. In addition, unlike private practice, as a lecturer, and part-time instructor, I don't have an office or a desk. Therefore, I am only at school when I teach so my interaction with my colleagues is much different than being in an office and working side by side with my studio mates.

What are the limitations or frustrations of being in a practicing instructor role?

Hard to say, other than it is so different than private practice on so many levels. As expected, the pay is nowhere near where it should be for experienced practitioners. One is not getting into teaching from private practice for compensation.

Do you think the lecturer model is sustainable for a practitioner?

I hope so, as they are integral members of the educating force for the future landscape architects of the world.

What has been the most rewarding aspect of teaching for you?

Seeing the proverbial light bulb going on for a student when they "get something" and do a great job on the assignment. Additionally, when they get their first job and let me know after the fact that they found my teaching to be helpful to them as they have entered the profession. The feeling is hard to beat, almost like your first project getting built.

Lecture to Palm Landscape in Guangzhou, China

What would you say to practicing professionals who are curious about teaching but unsure where to begin?

Go talk to the faculty members at the program first and see what their culture is like, the focus of the program, and what expectations they would have for you to teach. I would also reach out to other practitioners that you might know that teach already.

What kind of preparation, mindset, or support is necessary for practitioners to thrive in teaching roles?

On-boarding, orientation to the university-which is likely going to be a much larger organization than most practitioners have experienced. Some executive teaching / coaching, and a mentor that is part of the faculty.

How can universities better integrate practicing professionals into their programs, not just as lecturers, but as active participants in curriculum development?

I think this could be easy, but it comes down to a desire for this to happen. I think that this is what LAAB tries to do, with their standards, and some schools have advisory councils or committees, but these advisory councils, in my experience, do not have much to say about curriculum. This, and the gap between the academy and practice related to research, may be a tough thing to bridge, but I believe it is possible, as most, if not all programs rely upon some degree of part-time professionals to participate in the teaching of landscape architecture students.

What do you envision as the ideal relationship between academia and practice in landscape architecture?

Where departments find room for experienced professionals to contribute to the curriculum and the content of the program. Also, experienced professionals get involved in job placement for students, and/or mentorship and advising. My impression is not all part-time faculty members are asked to advise students.

Have you noticed any shifts in the profession that should be reflected more explicitly in design education?

I think technology and artificial intelligence (AI) will continue to create issues in the educational process as well as the profession.

Are there emerging trends in the profession (e.g., climate adaptation, equity, digital tools) that academia should prioritize more effectively?

Technology / digital tools, though this is a tough one, as I mentioned; more design and construction experience; and less capstone projects as the terminal assignment for graduate students. Make the capstone project an advanced design requirement, as most capstones, I would guess, are project-related, and have graduate students do more research and theses, as this helps with the critical thinking training. Now, the research that is being done is by PhDs and faculty. Then, typically, the PhDs turn around and then teach, with no practical experience, or licensure.

How do you see the role of adjunct/practicing faculty in landscape architecture evolving in the coming years?

Hard to say, but I hope that as the baby boomer bubble of practitioners begins to retire, some think about continuing to contribute to the profession and teach. It is my understanding that there are a lot of faculty members across the country that are getting near the retirement age-which if not planned for, can devastate a program.

Any additional thoughts that we didn't discuss?

One last thought: I would like to encourage faculty members to get some degree of certification (licensure) and take the Landscape Architect Registration Examination (LARE). If they are teaching the basics of the profession, simply having a degree and no license is not helping the profession in the minds of the University. I think more faculty members with some type of certification or licensure would, or could, raise the status of the profession in the minds of the University.

Many thanks for sharing your insights.

Bridging Academia and Practice

Education & Practice Interview Series

The Education & Practice Professional Practice Working Group is committed to supporting landscape architecture education that better aligns with the needs of the profession. To this end, this interview series is intended to provide firsthand insights for practitioners interested in teaching. Collectively, these interviews aim to offer a clearer picture of the nuts and bolts of academia-practice integration and to help guide practitioners who are considering a role in landscape architecture education.

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