Joel Towers was appointed Dean of Parsons in April 2009. An Associate Professor of Architecture and Sustainable Design, Joel has worked across Parsons and The New School where he has participated in the design and development of leading-edge new programs, curricular innovation, and the implementation of highly consultative and inclusive governance. Prior to his appointment as Dean of Parsons, Joel was the Dean of Parsons’ School of Design Strategies, one of Parsons five schools. The School of Design Strategies was formed as part of a Parsons-wide major academic restructuring and brings together the programs and faculty of the Integrated Design Curriculum, Design and Management, and the foundation year program. Under Joel, the School of Design Strategies played a major role in the development and delivery of new university-wide initiatives in urban design and environmental studies as well as plans for future graduate programs in transdisciplinary design and design management.

Joel came to The New School in 2004 in a new role as Director of Sustainable Design and Urban Ecology. In 2006, he became the inaugural Director of the Tishman Environment and Design Center and Associate Provost for Environmental Studies. In each of these roles he advanced institutional aims on a broad and ambitious scale, demonstrating a clear understanding of the shared intellectual paradigms emerging between the liberal arts, social sciences, and design. A prime example of this approach was the university-wide Environmental Studies degrees Joel helped to create in partnership with Eugene Lang College.

Prior to joining The New School, Joel taught in Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, developing cross-disciplinary teaching and research focused on sustainability and urban ecology in relation to urban design and architecture. A practicing architect for the past two decades, Joel co-founded the firm Sislian, Rothstein and Towers (SR+T Architects). For several years the firm maintained offices in New York and Berlin. Today the work generated through SR+T continues in new collaborations that extend the realm of traditional practice into construction, materials development, real estate development, and sustainable design.

Joel received his Masters in Architecture from Columbia University and his B.S. in Architecture from The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He lives with his family in Brooklyn, New York.