Cornell AAP announces eight new faculty members, including cross-disciplinary social justice cohort

The Cornell University College of Architecture, Art, and Planning (AAP) has announced that eight new faculty members will step into a handful of inaugural roles beginning in the fall semester. This includes professors who will comprise a five-member AAP social justice cohort working across disciplines to “advance scholarship, research, creative practice, and critical dialogue on social justice, equity, and identity.” Also joining is the college’s first-ever Associate Dean for Diversity and Equity along with two new professors—one a member of the Department of Art and the other a member of the Department of City and Regional Planning—who will join Critical Inquiry into Values, Imagination, and Culture (CIVIC), which is part of the Office of the Provost’s Radical Collaboration initiative.

“We are thrilled to welcome an extraordinary group of new faculty and fellows whose critical scholarship and creative practices, rigorous research, and lines of inquiry advance equity and justice across our disciplines,” said AAP Dean J. Meejin Yoon, in a statement. “As practitioners and educators, the work they do in and out of the classroom yields actionable knowledge and meaningful impact that has the potential to transform our cities, communities, and constructed environments both now and well into the future.”

The new faculty members are:

AAP Associate Dean for Diversity and Equity:

Jen Delos Reyes | Associate Professor, Art

Social justice cohort:

Peter Robinson | Assistant Professor, Architecture

Ife Vanable | Assistant Professor, Architecture

Oscar Rene Cornejo | Assistant Professor, Art

Oasa DuVerney | Assistant Professor, Art

Jocelyn Poe | Provost New Faculty Fellow, City and Regional Planning

CIVIC:

Keith Obadike | Professor, Art

Wenfei Xu | Assistant Professor, City and Regional Planning

Although the appointments are just being announced by Cornell AAP now, the new hires officially joined their respective departments earlier this summer. Poe, as a Provost New Faculty Fellow, will begin her appointment as assistant professor in the Department of City and Regional Planning in 2024.

In addition to its new faculty members, Cornell AAP also announced its inaugural Strauch Fellows. Per the school, the Strauch Fellowship was established to “advance inclusion, equity, and justice in architecture and planning by providing pathways to successful academic careers for emerging and impactful scholars and practitioners in these disciplines.” The fellows are: Sydney Maubert (Strauch Fellow, Architecture) and Zakhary Mallett (Strauch Fellow, City and Regional Planning).

Earlier this summer, the Ithaca, New York–based university—the only within the Ivy League with an architecture department offering Bachelor of Architecture degrees—revealed that it has received a $30 million gift to establish a new department, the Paul Rubacha Department of Real Estate, which will be jointly managed by Cornell AAP and the Cornell SC Johnson School of Business.

Read more about Cornell AAP’s new faculty and Strauch fellows here.