School of Architecture Assistant Professor Nina Wilson, Ph.D. has been honored with a Meredith Teaching Recognition Award for Early Performance from Syracuse University.
The Teaching Recognition Award program is sponsored by the Syracuse University Meredith Professors to recognize excellence in teaching and foster a culture of collegial mentoring among faculty members.
Wilson, a member of the faculty since 2019, teaches architectural technology and design research courses at the School of Architecture and advises doctoral, master of science, master of architecture and bachelor of architecture thesis and directed research students.
With over 15 years of experience in high-performance building technologies research and design, Wilson operates the interdisciplinary Applied Sciences & Technology Research in Architecture Lab, where she provides opportunities for architecture students to participate in externally funded multi-year research projects, such as the School of Architecture-led Net-Zero Energy Retrofit Living Lab. This three-year project at the Syracuse Center of Excellence—where Wilson is a Faculty Research Fellow—offers new insights, recommendations and data supporting the practice of retrofitting older buildings.
“Operating at the intersection of design, technology innovation and policy, my work questions the anthropocentric lensing of resilience in architecture through circular ecological framing of design, sustainable policy and technology in buildings,” says Wilson.
Wilson has excelled in bringing to life the vital importance in building technology within contemporary architecture and its existential criticality in the face of the climate crisis. Central to that effort has been her commitment to expanding the range of architectural designers and solutions that students are exposed to including low-energy global and Indigenous architectural technologies and carbon-sequestering bio-based material systems, while focusing on prioritizing diversity, equity and inclusion in her teaching.
In her building systems courses, Wilson successfully applies student engagement techniques acquired via participation in the Partnership for Equity and Inclusion (PIE) program offered through the Center for Teaching and Learning Excellence (CTLE) to improve students’ retention of knowledge, achievement of learning outcomes and overall course experience.
“Within the studio curriculum, Wilson pushed students to use actual building certification systems and processes as an evaluation method for a hypothetical design project—bringing real-world project experience into the classroom. This incredibly valuable exercise pushed our studio projects to meet the higher standards that many of us would face in the industry once we graduated,” one student said.
“Professor Wilson is contributing significantly to producing a generation of young designers with fundamentally different attitudes and approaches to how the built environment serves all of its stakeholders, limits impact on the natural environment and capitalizes on emerging technologies,” says Lori Brown, FAIA, distinguished professor of architecture.
Wilson is one of five Syracuse University faculty members to receive a Teaching Recognition Award in the Early Performance category. Other recipients for 2023–2024 include Kelly Leahy, Farzana Rahman, Milton Santiago and Darwin Tsen.
All were honored at the 2024 One University Awards ceremony on Friday, April 19 in Hendricks Chapel.
For more information, see news.syr.edu/blog/2024/04/10/members-of-the-university-community-to-be-honored-for-excellence-at-one-university-awards-ceremony-on-april-19/.
