Val is a graduate of the Waterloo School of Architecture and has been an adjunct faculty member since 1981 and a full-time faculty member since 1990. He also has an MA in History from the University of Guelph. His design work has won numerous competitions and awards, and focuses on urban design and land development, the landscape urbanism of the urban periphery, and the ecosystem design of green infrastructure. For undergraduates, he teaches the “Architecture of the Urban Environment” course in the 3B term, and the cultural history course “Enlightenment, Romanticism and the 19th Century” in the 3A term. At the graduate level, he co-ordinates an M1 masters studio focusing on sustainable design, and teaches a course in the “Ecosystem Design of Urban Landscapes”.
Research interests include: urban and environmental design; urban peripheries and abandoned city centres; the urban forms of globalization, ecosystem planning and management; the history of designed communities.