Erin Simmons is Senior Director of Design Assistance for Communities by Design, a program of the Architects Foundation. For more than 18 years, Erin has provided technical assistance to hundreds of communities around the world, leading democratic planning processes and training workshops focused on empowering citizens to create equitable, sustainable, and resilient communities. Her work has been featured in hundreds of news articles and publications, and she has spoken extensively as a subject matter expert on the topics of participatory planning, sustainability, and community revitalization. 

Prior to her work with Communities by Design, Erin worked as historic preservationist and architectural historian for an environmental and engineering firm, where she practiced preservation planning, created historic district design guidelines and zoning ordinances, and conducted historic resource surveys. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in History from Florida State University and a Master’s degree in Historic Preservation from the University of Georgia. Erin is an Academician of the Academy of Urbanism in London, UK.

With over 40 years of experience as a landscape architect, arborist, certified landscape inspector, and principal of Curtis + Rogers Design Studio, Aida Curtis is a leader in creating sustainable, inclusive spaces. As the head of South Florida’s premier Hispanic- and woman-owned landscape architecture firm, Aida has built a portfolio of award-winning projects spanning transportation, recreation, institutional, and civic spaces. Known for her innovative, cost-effective solutions, she excels in consensus-building and addressing challenges through clear and effective communication. 

A trailblazer in leveraging landscape architecture to combat climate change, Aida chairs the National ASLA Biodiversity and Climate Action Committee, advising ASLA leadership on strategies to promote biodiversity, ecological restoration, and climate adaptation. She also serves on the board of the Landscape Architecture Foundation, advancing the role of landscape architects as climate leaders and inspiring future generations. 

Among her many achievements, Aida led the Jose Marti Park Adaptive Redesign, Florida’s first WEDG-verified project and the second outside New York. As a member of the Technical Advisory Committee for WEDG V3.0, she played a pivotal role in promoting the adoption of WEDG verification for urban coastal projects by the City of Miami. 

Aida Curtis’s visionary leadership continues to shape the future of sustainable design, ensuring that landscape architecture remains at the forefront of addressing environmental and societal challenges. 

Cheryl is a licensed architect and Emerita Professor of Architecture in the School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape Architecture of Auburn University. In thirty years of teaching, she worked with architectural programs at Georgia Institute of Technology, Oklahoma State, and California College of Arts and Crafts. For the last 12 years of her teaching career, she was the Director of Auburn’s Urban Studio in Birmingham, Alabama. 

Under Cheryl’s leadership, the Urban Studio’s Small-Town Design Initiative Program worked with over 100 small towns and neighborhoods in Alabama. 

Morgan practiced architecture and urban design in the San Francisco Bay Area. She worked with a number of firms including Environmental Planning and Research, Gensler, and the Gruzen Partnership. Before coming to Auburn in 1992 she was an associate with the Berkeley firm of ELS/Elbasani and Logan. Morgan’s professional practice now focuses on urban design, community revitalization and graphic design. She is also an experienced facilitator. 

In 2011 she was presented with the Alabama Chapter of the American Planning Association’s Distinguished Leadership Award recognizing her as a “Friend of Planning.” In 2012 she received one of Auburn University’s highest awards for Achievement in Outreach and in 2017 the Alabama State Council on the Arts named Cheryl one of the recipients of their bi-annual Governor’s Award. 

In 2018 she gave a TEDx talk at TEDx Birmingham titled “Place Matters.” She is also active in the AIA’s Communities by Design program and has participated in a dozen R/UDATs including DATs in Dublin, Ireland, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and Freetown, Sierra Leone. 

She is a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects and a recipient of Alabama’s 2023 Gold Medal presented by the Alabama AIA to all Alabama FAIAs.