Meet the Faculty

Aaron Forbes Attended the University of Calgary, majoring in Economics and became a CFA Charter holder in 2013. He is a licensed member of the Real Estate Council of Alberta and has completed the Mortgage Associates Program and is currently a Senior Director with MCAP’s Development Finance Group. To date, he has been involved in the structuring of over $2.0 billion of real estate transactions throughout Western Canada, including 1st and 2nd mortgages and has completed syndications with most major Canadian Banks, Alberta based lending institutions, pension funds and life insurance companies. In 2012, he spent 2 months volunteering in Phnom Penh, Cambodia with the Sovann Phoum Organization, a non-profit micro credit lender. Aaron currently sits on the Board of Directors for KV Mortgage Fund Inc., a private Edmonton based lender, as an independent member and a member of the Lending Review Committee.

Emma MacKenzie is Director, Creative & Strategy at Chatterson, a Calgary-based performance marketing agency. Emma has spent the last 12 years at Chatterson, planning and executing strategic marketing for a multitude of real estate development clients across Western Canada. Emma specializes in strategy development, project visioning, creative execution and the important connections between buyer motivations and marketing success.

Iain G. McCorkindale has over two decades of experience in the real estate development sector and carries the professional accreditations of MRICS, PQS, and LEED AP©. Following an apprenticeship with Rolls Royce plc. where he earned his Sheet Metal Worker Journeyman papers, Iain enrolled at Glasgow’s Caledonian University and graduated in 1998 with a First Class B.Sc. (Hons.) Quantity Surveying Degree. Iain was then recruited by Helyar & Associates (now Altus Group) where he spent eight years in their Toronto Office, before moving with his family to Calgary in 2006 to start their construction cost management practice where he led a very successful team that serviced the Prairies. In terms of projects, Iain has worked on over 200 projects across the full asset class spectrum and provided advisory services for project lenders, developers, owners, and tenants across Canada and in select US locations. In 2011, Iain joined a prominent local real estate Owner / Developer where he built and led an in-house team focused on developing mixed-use projects. In mid-2016, Iain formed M3 Development Management Ltd. which is actively providing turnkey development and project management services on many prominent and large-scale projects in Calgary and throughout the Province of Alberta.

Mark Seasons is a Professor with the School of Planning at the University of Waterloo, which he joined in 1998 following almost 20 years in planning practice. He is a Fellow, Canadian Institute of Planners and a Registered Professional Planner (Ontario). Mark’s education includes a BA (Honours Geography – Queen’s); MEnvDes (Planning – Calgary); and PhD (Regional Planning – Waterloo). Mark has practiced as an urban planner with the City of Calgary, the New Zealand federal government, the Province of Ontario, and the Canadian federal government’s National Capital Commission. Throughout his professional career, he has worked in the areas of urban renewal, long-range planning, neighbourhood revitalization, regional planning, and non-profit housing. Mark’s research interests include plan evaluation, planning for climate change, strategic planning, and planning for slow-growth or declining cities. He has designed and delivered courses in land use planning, research methods, planning theory, program evaluation and regional planning. As a researcher, Mark has written and had published numerous articles in a variety of peer-reviewed journals. He’s also a member of the editorial boards of several academic journals for which he regularly reviews and evaluates articles that are submitted for publication. Mark was editor-in-chief of Plan Canada, the Canadian Institute of Planning’s practice-oriented journal, from 2005-10. In 2021, he published a sole-authored and peer-reviewed text on plan monitoring and evaluation (Evaluating Urban and Regional Plans: From Theory to Practice, UBC Press).

Rob Spanier is an international real estate development expert with two decades of experience dedicated to creating innovative, next-generation destinations and places. By playing an integral role on multi-disciplinary project teams, Rob commits his extensive knowledge in large-scale mixed-use development, master planning, specialty leasing and deal making as well as programming and activation in order to create vibrant and prosperous communities. Most notably, Rob has helped to develop Lakeview Village on Mississauga’s waterfront, the Woodbine Districts in Toronto, and the Canary District, the 2015 PanAm Games Athletes Village. Rob is an active member and leader with the Urban Land Institute (ULI).