Last July, architect and scholar Sarah Whiting became the first woman to lead the Harvard Graduate School of Design since its 1936 founding. Whiting, a GSD professor earlier in her career who served most recently as dean of Rice University’s School of Architecture, is part of a growing cadre of women heading the nation’s most prestigious architecture and design schools. Among Whiting’s colleagues who are influencing the future of how Americans live: Ila Berman at the University of Virginia (who assumed the post from Elizabeth Meyer), Amale Andraos at Columbia University, Monica Ponce de Leon at Princeton, Deborah Berke at Yale and J. Meejin Yoon at Cornell. While Whiting says she dislikes being referred to as “first woman…” she also says it’s high time. “This should have happened a while ago,” she told Architectural Digest. “I think it’s good for us to be reminded of that fact and for female and male students to see me in this position and for it to become natural.”
