Academic Leadership, Governance and Digital Education
Jason Taylor is a Senior Lecturer and Architectural Digital Design (ADD) Lead at Manchester School of Architecture, where he provides School-wide leadership for digitally enhanced and AI-aware education. His work operates at the intersection of pedagogy, digital infrastructure, institutional policy and governance, and emerging technologies, with a strong focus on equity, accessibility, and long-term sustainability at scale.
Jason holds formal leadership responsibility for Architectural Digital Design, Artificial Intelligence, and DELTA (Digitally Enhanced Learning, Teaching and Assessment). In these roles, he leads the strategic design and governance of digital education across MSA, aligning curriculum, learning environments, physical and digital infrastructure, and staff capability to ensure that digitally enhanced and AI-enabled teaching is coherent, ethical, and academically robust.
Pedagogy, Equity and Design Cognition
A core strand of Jason’s practice is the design of inclusive, multimodal learning environments that actively reduce barriers associated with digital poverty, neurodiversity, BAME student experience, and caring responsibilities. His pedagogic approach is grounded in constructive alignment and accessibility, with a particular interest in how AI and computational tools influence design cognition, creative problem-solving, and decision-making within the creative disciplines.
His teaching praxis sits at the intersection of pedagogy, cutting-edge technologies, and the relationship between analogue and digital design processes, ensuring that digitally enhanced learning supports depth of understanding rather than surface technical competence.
Digital Generalist Practice and Professional Alignment
As an architectural digital generalist, Jason maintains specialist working knowledge across a broad spectrum of contemporary digital design and fabrication practices. His expertise spans technical drawing and documentation, 3D modelling and BIM, computational and algorithmic design, coding and simulation, environmental modelling, visualization and animation, real-time engines, VR/AR/MR, UI/UX workflows, digital fabrication, robotics, IoT, and AI-assisted design processes.
This breadth underpins his leadership of curriculum design, assessment strategy, and infrastructure planning, ensuring alignment with evolving professional workflows and regulatory expectations, and enabling students and staff to operate confidently across analogue–digital boundaries.
Professional Background and Industry Collaboration
Before joining MSA, Jason held a lectureship at Birmingham City University as Digital Design Coordinator and previously worked at Ravensbourne University as a Technical Tutor and Prototyping Lab Manager, leading digital fabrication facilities and curriculum-integrated making across multiple disciplines.
Alongside academia, he has collaborated with leading architectural practices including Zaha Hadid Architects, RSHP, Gensler, ARUP, and Foster + Partners, as well as transdisciplinary partners across the creative industries. His work has also involved sustained collaboration with technology partners including Adobe, Autodesk, Chaos Group, and Epic Games, supporting knowledge exchange, staff development, and student access to industry-standard tools and workflows.
Professional Standing
Jason is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (SFHEA), a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA), and a Fellow of the Adobe Education Institute (AEI). He is committed to developing digital literacies, mentoring staff and students, and shaping ethical, inclusive approaches to digital and AI-enabled education within the creative disciplines.
External Engagement, Esteem and Impact
Jason maintains an active international profile in digitally enhanced and AI-enabled education, with sustained engagement across higher education, industry, and policy-adjacent contexts. He is Programme Lead for AI for Educators at the United Nations Institute for Training and Research in Geneva, where he works with senior academic leaders globally to translate AI strategy into educational design, governance, and practice across diverse disciplinary and institutional contexts.
In parallel, he undertakes advisory and consultancy activity with UK and international higher education institutions, supporting curriculum development, AI policy translation, and the design of digitally enhanced learning environments at scale. Jason is also regularly invited to deliver keynotes, panels, and sector-facing contributions focused on digital education, AI, and creative practice, and collaborates with sector bodies and platform partners to support inclusive, future-facing approaches to digital education.
Selected Recent Keynotes, Panels and Conferences
- Forum for the Built Environment – AI: Friend or Foe? (Keynote)
- BIM in Series (Leicester) – Keynote and Panel (2025)
- BIM in Series (Leicester) – Keynote and Panel (2026)
- Adobe Community Connect – Manchester (Invited Keynote)
- Adobe Community Connect – Hatfield (Invited Keynote)
- MMU Learning and Teaching Conference (LEED) – Invited Roundtable
- Digital Futures Global Seminar – Keynote and Roundtable
Awards & Recognition
- Teaching Excellence Award, Manchester Metropolitan University (Winner, 2025)
- Inspirational Teacher of the Year, Manchester Metropolitan University (Finalist, 2020 and 2021)
- O2 Postgraduate Award for Innovation (Winner, 2016)
- D&AD Wood Pencil (Winner, 2013)
- RSA Student Awards (Finalist)
- Lighting Designer of the Year (Finalist)