Jon Alvarez, AIA
Director
Jon comes to us from Wellesley College where he has worked since 2012, most recently as Director of Design and Construction. Prior to working at Wellesley, Jon held a variety of positions in both the public and private sectors, and he brings 35 years of relevant experience to the role. His work in higher education includes stints at Yale University as Senior Architect and Planner, and at the University of Connecticut as Senior Project Manager. Jon holds the degree of Bachelor of Architecture from Cornell University and is a licensed Architect in Connecticut and Massachusetts.
Kitty Drexel
Senior Administrative Assistant
Kitty is a senior administrative assistant. She assists the OCP team in their administrative tasks.
Amy Kaiser, AICP
Senior Campus Planner
Amy Kaiser joined the Office of Campus in 2016. As a Senior Campus Planner, she works on a variety of projects involving both internal and external constituencies. Amy is honored and delighted to be back at MIT, where she earned a Masters in City Planning in 2005.
Prior to joining the Office of Campus Planning, Amy was a Senior Associate with a nationally recognized architecture, planning and preservation firm, where she led planning initiatives for colleges and universities, urban neighborhoods, and waterfronts. Her work received recognition from the American Planning Association (APA) and the Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU). Amy brings over a decade of professional planning experience, and is a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP), the American Planning Association (APA), and the Society for College and University Planning (SCUP).
Jennifer Marshall
Assistant Director, Campus Planning
With nearly twenty years of experience at MIT, Jennifer guides the development of campus-scale planning initiatives and major building projects. She works with MIT faculty, students and staff as well as external consultants to advance projects, build consensus among stakeholders and support decision-makers. Since joining the Institute, she has managed the development of sector plans, strategic system plans, school-wide planning initiatives and facility programs, including those for the Sidney Pacific graduate residence, the Brain and Cognitive Sciences building, and the planned Theater Arts facility on Vassar Street. She also served as the planner on the MIT team for the Framework for Campus Development with Olin Partnership in 2000 and was a principal member of the in-house team for MIT Vision 2030.
Before joining MIT, Jennifer worked as a planner and in other capacities for architectural and urban design firms in New York and Boston as well as for higher-educational programs in community service and architectural research. Jennifer has a Masters in City Planning with a focus on City Design and Development from MIT and a BA in English and Studio Art from Connecticut College.
Vasso Mathes
Senior Campus Planner
Vasso joined the Office of Campus Planning in early 2019. Before MIT, Vasso was a capital project manager for Babson College, Wellesley College, and Harvard University Real Estate Services working on a wide variety of higher education buildings. Vasso is a graduate of Tulane University, where she earned a master’s in architecture, and worked for many years as designer at firms including Sasaki Associates and Goody Clancy. During her time with Goody Clancy, Vasso worked in partnership with Charles Correa Associates and Turner Construction providing construction administration for MIT’s own Brain and Cognitive Sciences Complex. In her free time, she enjoys cooking for her friends and family, hiking and organic vegetable gardening.
Morgan Pinney, AIA
Senior Campus Planner
Morgan Pinney is a licensed architect and a physical planner. She works primarily on major building projects, programming and space studies, and campus-wide design and space-related initiatives. She joined the OCP team in November 2015.
Morgan received a Masters in Architecture from MIT. Prior to returning to the Institute in her current role, she worked as a campus planner at UMass Lowell, where she was responsible for long term physical planning, capital project management, programming and space planning. Before focusing her professional attention on academic institutional facilities, she worked for a small design firm, Santos Prescott and Associates, in Somerville, MA. Morgan also has a BA in Studio Art from Oberlin College and is passionate about issues of equity, local food systems, and holistic lifestyles.
Todd Robinson, RLA, ASLA
Senior Campus Planner
Todd is a registered landscape architect and campus planner and has been with MIT since 2015. Todd uses his design experience to help consultants and MIT project teams collaborate successfully throughout the various phases of design and construction for landscape and building projects, including consultant selection, concept and schematic design, construction documentation, and quality assurance.
After receiving his Masters in Landscape Architecture from Cornell University in 2011, he moved to Boston and worked at local landscape architectural firms before joining the MIT team. Todd graduated with a Bachelor of Science from the University of Iowa.
Melissa Stopa, AICP
Senior Campus Planner
Melissa joined the Office of Campus Planning in 2013. In her role as a campus planner, Melissa’s work primarily focuses on long-range campus studies and commuter and transportation projects. She also conducts GIS analysis and supports a variety of other projects across the Office of Campus Planning. Melissa has a Bachelors degree in Mathematics from Boston College and a Masters degree from the Department of Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning at Tufts University. She is a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP) and a LEED Green Associate.
Laura Tenny, RLA, ASLA
Senior Campus Planner
Laura Tenny is a registered landscape architect and senior campus planner with more than 25 years of work experience leading the planning, design, and construction phases of landscape and building projects for higher educational institutions. A member of the Office of Campus Planning since 2011, Laura’s focus is on the creation and stewardship of campus landscapes that are welcoming, accessible, resilient, and reflective of MIT’s unique spirit. Recent and current projects include MIT’s “Outfinite Corridor” that transformed a utilitarian service alley into an active campus crossing, and the development of a campus-wide wayfinding signage system. Laura holds a Masters degree in Landscape Architecture from the Harvard Graduate School of Design. In her free time she gets outdoors to enjoy skiing, hiking, paddle-boarding, and cycling through the changing New England seasons.