Schaeffer Somers

Education

University of Virginia, Master of Architecture
University of Virginia, Bachelor of Science in Aerospace Engineering

Biography

Schaeffer Somers is a registered architect and assistant professor in Architecture and Public Health at the University of Virginia. His background in aerospace engineering and manned space flight allows him to jump fences and translate the languages and methods of design and research between multiple disciplines. Schaeffer’s teaching and research focuses on systems thinking to understanding the relationships between health and the built environment and how design and policy impacts social and environmental determinants of health. He adapts methods of program evaluation in public health and policymaking as tools for creating conceptual frameworks that can be used in evidence-based practices of design and planning. Schaeffer is currently focused on visualizing causal and hidden relationships of health impact and human ecologies from the individual to population level health outcomes.

He is also the Department of Architecture's NCARB Licensing Advisor.