Exciting news: Atlanta cultural developer and alumnus Gene Kansas recently agreed to joining Kathy Goonan and Lester Tate on our School of Literature, Media, and Communication Advisory Board. In his 20+ years in Atlanta commercial real estate, Gene Kansas has garnered a reputation as a champion of historic preservation, adaptive reuse, community building, and storytelling through the built environment. Each Gene Kansas project aims to blend an appreciation of culture and history with creative, responsible, and vital refashioning that brings new relevance to space and how it is used by clients, neighborhoods, and the city. The founder and president of Gene Kansas | Commercial Real Estate, Gene leads with passion and purpose, with the ability of looking forward and a mindset of giving back. Company accomplishments include: the historic preservation of the Atlanta Daily World Building in Sweet Auburn, named the #2 Preservation Win by the National Trust for Historic Preservation in 2014. Gene is also creator and founder of Constellations, “where stars come together to shine,” a civic and socially-based shared workspace on Auburn Avenue. Constellations proudly received a “Development of Excellence” award from the Atlanta Regional Commission in 2018. Among many accolades, Gene received an Atlanta Magazine Groundbreakers Award in 2017, as well as the 2016 Ivan Allen, Jr. Legacy Award from the Georgia Institute of Technology. He was also named an Atlanta Business Chronicle “40 Under 40.” As the creator and host of the award-winning radio program Sidewalk Radio, Gene spent five seasons exploring life in the modern city through the lens of history and the context of community. Gene holds a BS in Entrepreneurship from the U of Arizona, and a MS in Digital Media from the School of Literature, Media, and Communication at Georgia Tech. Gene is committed to helping bring business insights to the cultural and creative classroom. Dedicated to community building, Gene hopes to share the goodwill, contacts, connections, and access to Atlanta he has built over his career, and leverage those assets to the benefit of the School, the College, the Institute, and most of all to the students.