May 5, 2010

We are pleased to announce the appointment of Jon Coddington, AIA, as the new Department Head of Architecture & Interiors commencing September 1, 2010.  Jon Coddington spent the last three years as the Program Director for the River City Company, a non-profit working on the revitalization of downtown Chattanooga. Previously he served as Chair of the Department of Architecture at Ball State University. While at Ball State, a new Master of Architecture program and a Center for Historic Preservation were created and successfully launched under his leadership.  Prior to Ball State, Jon Coddington was a Professor of Architecture at the University of Tennessee where he also served as the head of the graduate program. His work at River City has included a multi-screen Carmike Cinema, the first LEED movie in the U.S, with Gold LEED certification. He has extensive experience doing master plans for important projects in Tennessee including the master plans, design and implementation for Tennessee’s Capitol Grounds; for Tennessee’s Bicentennial Mall; for the Oak Ridge National Laboratory; as well as for many other public and private institutions. He designed the Unitarian Universalist Church in Oak Ridge, Tennessee and the James Agee Park in downtown Knoxville. Mr. Coddington has been honored with the Tennessee Society of Architect’s Presidential Award for Distinguished Service, as well as numerous other awards from the American Society of Landscape Architects, and the Tennessee Society of Architects.  Mr. Coddington received a Master of Architecture from the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Tennessee.

At this time we would also like to thank Paul Hirshorn who has served as the founding Head of the Department of Architecture & Interiors for the past three years.  Under his leadership the diverse Architecture and Interiors programs have worked to find their common ground and to set the stage for increased inter-disciplinary collaboration in the future.   Although Professor Hirshorn is stepping down as Department Head, we are delighted that he will continue to serve as Program Director for Architecture as he has done for the past twenty four years. We are also grateful that he will be here to assist Jon Coddington in his transition to Drexel and to the Philadelphia design community.