Central Co-op

Central Co-op is a new office, established by Northeastern’s Chancellor in 2024 to strengthen cooperative education across the university. Over a six-month co-op, I helped build it from the ground up — its brand and communications system, its social presence, and the research to understand what students actually struggle with. Two audiences (faculty and employers), one real stake: whether students’ co-op experience gets better.

“The transitioning into the semi-professional world is clunkily done.” — a student

The identity I built — roll-up banners, the booth system, and merch students actually kept — deployed on the floor at recruiting and admitted-student events. The other half of the co-op: two Instagram accounts, co-managed over six months and grown from zero into a resource for students, employers, and faculty.

We built a large sampling frame, grouped interested students by availability, and ran focus groups — 50 minutes of structured discussion plus 10 minutes of live Mentimeter polls. Twenty-five students surfaced three areas of challenge in the Northeastern co-op process: competitive nature, emotional and mental wellness, and professional development.

This was my first professional design role — a real office, real stakeholders, and work that shipped: a brand deployed at career fairs, a social presence grown 900%, and research that put student voices in front of the people who run co-op. Institutional design is three jobs at once — you build the identity, you earn the audience, and you bring the evidence. The most useful thing a designer can do inside an institution is make what students actually experience impossible to ignore.