EQUITY IN ARCHITECTURE FORUM 2019
February 28, 2019 6 PM - 9 PM | Georgia Tech School of Architecture
1 AIA CEU Credit
For more information about the event location, time, and logistics, click here.
To watch the event’s recording, click here.
PROVOCATION
Is the practice of architecture fundamentally equitable? While women represent nearly half of current architecture school graduates, the number of licensed architect and senior leadership positions held by women remains between 15 and 18 percent. The numbers are even more skewed for representation of diverse race, nationality, and socio-economic status. Survey results show disparity in access to education, job satisfaction, and pay at every level of experience. Our future, if unchanged, indicates a lack of diversity in academic and professional leadership.
We, the architecture students of Georgia Tech, believe that our field of study and practice must undergo radical change to remain relevant. Antiquated institutional practices built upon traditional power-structures, inherent biases, and exclusionary policies must be cut. As students, we have experienced the benefits of a diverse cohort first-hand. We are dedicated to being the allies, agents, and advocates of a diverse and equitable future in our academic and professional work. Attaining an equitable discipline is our highest priority and responsibility as architects.
The Forum is intended to further excavate issues surrounding identity, inclusion, and power, and how these concepts can be purposefully framed in our actions. Equity is defined by the notion that all people, regardless of socio-economic, gender, racial, or ethnic associations, have fair access to the resources and opportunities necessary to thrive. How can we maximize our agency for change as students and young professionals?
KEYNOTE
WANONA SATCHER | Social Entrepreneur, Urban Designer, Community Development Strategist
Wanona is an urban designer, landscape architectural designer, and city planner originally from Atlanta, Georgia. She is Founder and CEO of Mākhers Studio LLC a design-build social enterprise and creative hub. Wanona is also CEO of ReJuve Corp a nonprofit dedicated to social impact through innovative community engagement strategies. Her work combines landscape architecture, shipping container housing, systems design and community advocacy to facilitate equitable revitalization. Mrs. Satcher has written for the Huffington Post, participated in Founders University in Silicon Valley, the Aspen Institute-CityLab, Bloomberg Philanthropies and was a Next City Vanguard Top 40 Under 40 Program. She has collaborated with The White House and digital media studio Plympton, University of North Carolina Kenan Institute for Private Enterprise, Startup Weekend, and Duke University Fuqua School of Business. Wanona is a graduate of Auburn University’s College of Architecture, Design and Construction (CADC) Landscape Architecture and Community Planning programs. Mrs. Satcher also holds Economic Development and Finance Professional Certification from the National Development Council (NDC) in small business development and real estate development financing.
PANELISTS
YOUSEF BUSHEHRI | PhD Student & Architecture Faculty
Georgia Institute of Technology
Yousef Bushehri is working toward his Ph.D. in architecture, examining how the design of the built environment plays a role in disability, aging, psychological health, and healthcare processes. He has written about NICUs, older-adult communities, pediatric oncology clinics, and housing designed for the needs of young adults with disabilities. He completed his M.S. in Architecture at Georgia Tech focusing on healthcare design, and his M.Arch. and B.S. Arch. in Washington, D.C., focusing on psychology and healthy aging. Before Georgia Tech, Bushehri was an artist-in-residence for 89plus at Google in Paris and was a practicing architect in Kuwait.
HEATHER INFANTRY | Executive Director, GENERATOR
Heather Infantry is the inaugural Executive Director of GENERATOR, Ryan Gravel's “retro-futurist-Beltline-social-house,” which seeks to bring people together to generate ideas that shape the future of cities. Prior to working with GENERATOR Heather was Director of Strategy and Expansion for a creative youth development program known as Moving in the Spirit,, where she led a $9M capital campaign to fund a new arts learning center that will open in Atlanta in 2020. Heather holds a B.A. in Theater from Georgia State University and an MBA in Nonprofit Management from Trinity University. She sits on the boards of United Arts Front, MARTA Arts Council, Pinnacle Credit Union, Old Fourth Ward Business Association and the newly formed African Diasporic Art Museum Atlanta (ADAMA).
LEELAND MCPHAIL | Associate, BLDGS
An Atlanta native, Leeland attended Georgia Institute of Technology, where he was a President’s Scholar and Alpha Rho Chi Medalist. He attended Yale School of Architecture, where he edited Retrospecta, the school’s yearly publication, researched Timber Cities with Alan Organschi, and graduated as the Frederick C. Bland Scholar in 2014. While working with the Brooklyn office Bernheimer Architecture, he was project designer on a 300,000 sq. ft. affordable and senior housing project in New York, as well as a community library in Ghana. He is a board member of the Ghana Free Communities Library, an organization that serves communities in Ghana without access to books and places of learning. His interest in labor has taken him from Architecture Lobby contributions in New York to factories in Bangladesh. Although Leeland’s work has been published and exhibited internationally, he gives his time locally; Leeland manages projects for Neighbor in Need, an organization recognized by the Georgia State Legislature that combats displacement by providing elderly and low income residents with critical home repairs.
VERNELLE NOEL | Ventulett NEXT Generation Visiting Fellow
Georgia Institute of Technology
VERNELLE A. A. NOEL is a Computational Designer, Architect, Artist, and Research Scientist who has practiced and taught design in the U.S., the Caribbean, India, and Singapore. Currently the 2018 NEXT Fellow at Georgia Tech, she investigates making practices from socio-technical and computational design points of view, and their implications for architecture and design. Currently a Ph.D. Candidate at Penn State, Vernelle holds a Master of Science in Architecture from MIT, a Bachelor of Architecture from Howard University, and a Diploma in Civil Engineering from the UTT. She has received several awards for her work, which employs a multi-disciplinary approach that intersects architecture and design, human computer interaction, technology and society studies, and advanced computation. A TEDx Speaker in 2015, Vernelle’s talk was entitled, "The Power of Making: Craft, Computation, and Carnival."
LIZ YORK | FAIA, Mother of Three, Architect
Liz York, FAIA, LEED-AP serves as Chief Sustainability Officer and Associate Director for Quality and Sustainability for a national public health organization. Appointed as the organization’s first CSO in 2008, Liz has established sustainability in policy and operations, implemented healthy and sustainable work environments, and facilitated staff involvement in sustainability efforts. She is a registered architect, and holds a Bachelor of Science and Master of Architecture, both from Georgia Institute of Technology. Liz has received two White House awards for Sustainability, been named to the Atlanta Business Chronicle’s Sustainability Who’s Who, and been recognized by the American Institute of Architects as a Fellow for her work to impact health and well-being by empowering architects to build better environments. She has strengthened policy and understanding around the health impacts of the physical environment, gender issues in design, access to healthy food, and design effects on health equity.
