Tya is currently the Director of Project Planning & Design at Habitat for Humanity Philadelphia and Adjunct Professor at Temple and Thomas Jefferson Universities. She has served as the Public Member on the AIA Philadelphia Board of Directors since 2014, currently also as the Director of Equitable Development. Tya received her BARCH at Syracuse University and her MARCH at the University of Pennsylvania. Since then she has focused her career on real estate and community development; prioritizing affordable housing creation, economic development, creative place-making and urban revitalization.
She also serves on the boards of Families Forward- a family shelter combating homelessness, National NOMA - the National Organization of Minority Architects, and is President Emeritus of PhilaNOMA. She also volunteers her time on behalf of Hip Hop Architecture Camp and StreetBoxPHL. From 2017- 2018 she traveled internationally observing the design of public housing as the Stewardson Keefe Lebrun Travel grant recipient, awarded by the Center for Architecture Foundation. In practice, Tya focuses on the revitalization of urban communities and how experience of the built environment shapes perceptions of place.
Tya will begin her new role on October 21, 2020.
