He earned his PhD in Regional Planning from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2013. A seasoned performer of improvisational comedy, Boyer has just begun exploring the usefulness of improvisational theater as a metaphor for how plans work as signals in complex urban regions. He is a co-principle investigator with the NSF-funded Integrated Network for Social Sustainability (INSS) and teaches courses in urban planning and urban sustainability.