Ayham Mouad (*1985, Syrian) has studied Architecture at the University of Damascus, Syria. He graduated in 2007 and was given a rank of 3\170 graduates, and this rank qualified him to hold a position in his college where he supervises the undergraduates in the studios where they learn Architectural Design and Drawing & Patterns courses, along with his postgraduate studies to get Master of Architecture in Damascus University in Dynamic Architecture and its mutual effect on the external envelope for buildings and their internal spaces. During his studies, Ayham had worked at the Consultant Centre for Architecture and Construction as a designer and supervisor for more than 3 years, the Arch. Code office as a manager and a teacher for architectural software such as (3Ds.MAX\ AutoCAD\ Adobe Photoshop CS4\ Sketch Up) and freehand drawing & rendering. He participated in many competitions and he was awarded the third prize for Barada River Rehabilitation competition in Damascus in 2011.

Baher Elshaarawy (*1980) has studied Urban and Regional Planning at the University of Cairo in Egypt. He has graduated in 2002 and worked for General Organization for Physical Planning in Egypt from 2003 until 2011 as a senior urban planner. He has worked also for many Planning consultation centers through his career, that included the Engineering center and Planning and Architecture Consultation ECAPAC, Egypt (2009-2011) as a general coordinator of the Urban Planning projects and director of GIS department, the Urban Developing Company, KSA (2007-2009) as urban designer, the Dr.Faisal Abdel-Maksoud consulting engineering and planning office in Egypt (2004-2007) as urban planner and the Ahmed Farid Mustafa consultancy office, KSA (2002-2003) as Urban Planner.

Ebtihal is a graduate of the Faculty of Urban and Regional Planning, Cairo-Egypt. She has seven years of urban planning and design experience working with government organizations and international consultants with hands on the supporting technical studies, within Egypt and GCC countries. She has been engaged on planning projects at a variety of scales from national level policy making to metropolitan structure plans, municipality, town and district plans. She also has previous knowledge in the preparation of upgrading projects specifically in squatter settlements including doing researches on the concepts of upgrading, including its impact on the international and local levels and its case studies. Her previous training and project management abilities have also aided her to take part in capacity building activities related to planning, while closely working and involving local authorities in project preparation.

Eslam is an Urban Designer/Planner with a good track record in integrated design processes, land use planning, landscape architecture projects, strategic and detailed master plans and hands on technical expertise in the same fields. Since his graduation from the Faculty of Urban and Regional Planning, Cairo University in 2004, he has been working on various projects that vary from small scaled residential projects to large-scaled master plans projects. He also has a diploma of Economics and Development from the Institute of National Planning, Cairo. Most of his work was in multidisciplinary team works for planning in communities that link urban design, social structure of inhabitants and the sustainability of both in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, as well as other projects located in different countries. He believes that a sustainable approach is essential for the urban development particularly in the MENA region that is why he pursued another experience in Europe and is now involved in the IUSD program.

Franziska (*1979, Dresden) studied Architecture at the Technical University of Berlin. During her studies she volunteered in projects in Berlin, Syria and Burkina Faso and worked as a free lance expert on old city rehabilitation. Her graduation project was a comparative urban and sociological study on urban informality in Bangladesh, Burkina Faso and Syria. From 2007 until 2008, she worked as a GTZ-consultant for the Urban Development Programme in Syria. From 2008 until 2011, she worked as a DED/GIZ expert for the administrational and physical set up of an archive and documentation center in Aleppo. Furthermore, she belonged to the support team of the elaboration of a City Development Strategy for Aleppo and volunteered in several local cultural events and publications. Since 2003, she is researching on a long term case study on informal urban growth in Damascus, Syria. Interim results have been presented during conferences and research meeting in Syria and Italy, and are about to be published.

Ghevar (*1978) has studied architecture at Tishreen university in Lattakia, Syria, and was awarded the Diploma degree in urban planningfrom al Baath university in Homs, Syria. At the same university she resumed her researches till getting the Master degree in urban planning in 2008. Since then she has been working in the urban field with the DJAM (Directorate General of Antiquities and Museums) and the OFL (the Office of the First Lady) as well as getting the opportunity to attend a lot of practical courses on urbanism, heritage, environment, and sustainability with national and international institutions (EU, ICCROM, AGA KHAN, MAM, DJAM …) Besides the studies at Stuttgart university at the moment she is preparing the research papers for her PhD thesis at Damascus university in Syria.

From 2003 to 2006 Insaf (*1985) studied architecture at the national school of architecture and urbanism in Sidi Bou Said, Tunisia. From 2006 to 2009, she finished her studies at National Higher School of architecture of Paris La Villette