The GCA is pleased to welcome new team member, Aujean Lee, an assistant professor of Regional and City Planning. Lee earned her PhD from UCLA in the Department of Urban Planning, where she was also a research associate for the UCLA Center for Neighborhood Knowledge. Her research focuses on residential segregation and racial disparities in homeownership, wealth and community institutions. She also examines nonprofits in providing social protections to vulnerable communities in uncertain policy circumstances. One of Lee’s recent projects investigates the effects of ethnic neighborhoods on Latino and Asian housing choice and foreclosure outcomes. Her work has received support from several sources, including the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, the UCLA Franklin D. Gilliam, Jr. Social Justice Award and the UCLA Institute on Inequality and Democracy. She was also nominated and awarded the Don T. Nakanishi Award for Outstanding Engaged Scholarship by the UCLA Asian American Studies Center. Her work has been published in several journals, including Nonprofit Voluntary Sector Quarterly, The International Indigenous Policy Journal, and Housing Policy Debate.
Dr. Lee plans to extend her dissertation to examine homeownership in ethnic neighborhoods across different U.S. metropolitan regions. While homeowners in middle-class Asian and Latino neighborhoods had lower odds of default and foreclosure in Los Angeles, this next project will assess housing market and demographic factors on foreclosures through a comparative analysis. She is also developing a project on nonprofit density in the Midwest and fiscal impacts after the 2016 Election due to changes in social service infrastructure and policies.
Christopher C. Gibbs College of Architecture assistant professor Amy Leveno and Mark Leveno, co-founders of OFFICIAL Design, have received a 2026 AIA Central States Region Design Award for the firm’s Granger Annex Community Center project in Garland, Texas.
Construction Industry Speaker Series welcomed Stephen Evans from the Oklahoma City National Memorial & Museum to give a lecture on better conversations and relationship building.
The University of Oklahoma Christopher C. Gibbs College of Architecture Hall of Fame recognizes a select number of high-character individuals who have made a significant and lasting positive impact on Gibbs College, its students, staff, faculty, alumni and/or to communities across the globe. The impact may have been, or continues to be, in the form of service and mentorship, sustained professional excellence, and/or advancement and financial support. Joseph Edgar Smay is part of the 2025 Hall of Fame class.
