Magda Mostafa is an Associate Professor of Design and Associate Chair of the Department of Architecture at the American University in Cairo (AUC) as well as a Design Associate at Progressive Architects. In addition to teaching at AUC, where she helped set up the school’s first architecture program- as well as graduate the first cohort of students during the Arab Spring uprising of 2011- she is the African representative to the UNESCO-UIA Architectural Education Commission and Validation Council. The council helps shape architectural education policy world-wide, and Mostafa is focused particularly on agendas to legitimize and require the study of alternative, parallel practices of architecture in educational institutions. Her work has ranged widely from private architectural practice to consultancy for public and private sector projects and educational institutions in Egypt, the Middle East, North America, Australia, New Zealand and Europe. Mostafa has a special interest in architectural design for children with special needs and sensory challenges; with a focus on autism. She is the author of the world's first set of evidence-based autism design guidelines, Autism ASPECTSS™, which was trademarked in 2013 and recently presented at the United Nations as a framework for international autism design policy. It was awarded the UIA International Research Award in 2014. She consults globally and has shaped autism projects in Europe, the US, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates. Resources and information about her work can be found at www.autism.archi Her recent TedTalk can be viewed at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0H-6iIyQ9Bs She has also developed a focus on the role of informal design practice in shaping today’s cities. Her most recent research is on the Juxtopolis© Pedagogy: which is a studio based research/design methodology that addresses the city as a series of layers and design as a process of navigation amongst, as opposed to imposition upon, those layers - using Cairo as a case study for that methodology. The Juxtopolis© Pedagogy's resultant work has been presented and exhibited worldwide, including at Columbia University's GSAPP; the Young Architects International program in Antalya (YAIA); the International Union of Architect's World Congress in Durban, South Africa; and most recently at the 2016 Venice Biennale. It is also an integral part of AUC's Cairo in the Curriculum program. She is co-author of the book "Learning from Cairo" and her Juxtopolis Pedagogy was recently featured in Columbia University's book series on Architecture and the City "The Arab City: Architecture and Representation" edited by Amale Andraos and Nora Akawi.

Special needs and inclusive design Design pedagogy