Karen Seong is the Undergraduate Director at the School of Architecture, Academy of Art University, where she advocates for under-represented students. She is a proponent of online education as a means to meaningfully diversify the architectural profession. Her pedagogy of examining identity formation in architectural spaces, published by Axel Menges, asks students to tell their personal stories through studio projects. Prior to teaching, she held leadership positions with Skidmore Owings and Merrill in New York and in San Francisco working collaboratively with large international teams on award-winning projects ranging from high-rises to institutional buildings in the US and in the Middle East. She has previously taught at UC Berkeley and has been a guest critic at various institutions in the US and in Korea. She holds a Master of Architecture with distinction from Columbia University and a Bachelor of Arts in Architecture with high honors from UC Berkeley. She was born in South Korea and lived in Malaysia before immigrating to the US at age 19.
