As part of the College of Architecture’s changes in leadership, effective August 1, Dr. Nancey Green Leigh will take over the as the College’s associate dean for research. She is replacing Dr. Steven French, who took over as dean of the College on July 1. In this role she will work to strengthen both the research support infrastructure within the College and the interdisciplinary ties within the College and across the Institute.

“One of my primary goals for the College is to focus on pursuing research opportunities that link design with cutting edge technology and research,” said Steven French, dean of the College of Architecture.  “Nancey is an excellent choice to spearhead our efforts in that area as she has extensive experience leading collaborative, interdisciplinary research teams.”

“The College of Architecture, by leveraging its strengths in design, planning and creativity along with Georgia Tech’s prowess in technology, is uniquely positioned to pursue research projects in a wide variety of areas,” said Leigh. “These include sustainable development problems and opportunities in green building, alternative energy, health care, digital design and information technologies that are all part of the Institute’s research agenda.”

Professor Leigh has been a member of the Georgia Tech faculty since 1994, specializing in economic development planning, sustainability, redevelopment, brownfields and urban industry.

 Included among the funders of Leigh’s research are the National Science Foundation, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, U.S. Housing and Urban Development, Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, Brookings Institution, and Fannie Mae Foundation. From 2006 to 2012, she led a large-scale multidisciplinary research grant focused on modeling material flows for sustainable industrial systems for urban regions. The research team included faculty and students from three universities and the disciplines of chemical engineering, mechanical engineering, economic geography, and planning. 

 Leigh has published over 50 articles and four books. She is the lead author of Planning Local Economic Development (5th edition, 2013), a widely used textbook and resource for practitioners working in planning and policy development.  

Leigh is currently co-editor of the Journal of Planning Education and Research, the journal of record for the planning academy. Before this appointment as associate dean for research, she served as Ph.D. program director in the School of City and Regional Planning. 

Prior to coming to Georgia Tech, Leigh was an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She was elected a Fellow of the American Institute of Certified Planners in 2008, has been a Woodrow Wilson Fellow, a Regents Fellow of the University of California, and past vice president of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning. She holds a Ph.D. in City and Regional Planning and a Master’s degree in Economics from the University of California at Berkeley, as well as a Master’s degree in regional planning from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.