Applied through: Licentiate APC (L-APC)

Commended: Whole submission

Qualifications

BA (Hons) Geography with International Study at University of Manchester (2011-2015)

MCD Town and Regional Planning at University of Liverpool (part-time 2017-2019)

Experiences

I began work as a Graduate Planning Officer at Manchester City Council in September 2017 where I had a caseload of planning applications to assess, negotiate and ultimately determine. Predominantly commercial and higher education developments in the centre of Manchester. Alongside my work, my employer supported me to undertake a part-time Masters in Planning at the University of Liverpool.

In November 2020 I began a new role as a Planning and Enabling Manager with Homes England, the government’s housing accelerator. In this role I oversee a variety of small- and large-scale projects where I seek to de-risk land and deliver planning certainty to help develop new housing in the North West of England.

APC Tips

It’s never too early to start your journal – I started my journal several months before the 2 year start date. It helped me get into the swing of writing about my work, and also reflecting on what I had learnt. It’s also much easier to write about your work experiences as they are happening, rather than trying to remember two years later! I was certainly thankful that I started early when it came to submission.

Make use of your mentor and others – I was fortunate to have a mentor who had overseen several APC submissions. She was able to use her experience of previous submissions to point out where I wasn’t being clear enough in my essay. I also approached other colleagues who had submitted recently, this was really useful as their advice and experience reflected the latest RTPI guidance.

Stick to Planning – planners can get called in to all kinds of tasks during their day job, such as project management, budgeting, staff resourcing. These are all vital skills which are very useful to your job, but they aren’t always directly applicable to the APC key competencies. I was helpfully encouraged to focus on the planning work I did - in the examples I used in my submission, and avoid talking about some of the examples which are less relevant to planning.