Social Design (MA)

Graduate Fellowships

Graduate Fellowships enable M.A. in Social Design students to put their skills into practice in professional contexts.

The Center for Social Design has developed a number of opportunities for current M.A. in Social Design (MASD) students to pursue professional, paid, part-time fellowships with a variety of institutions during their MASD year. 

Examples of Graduate Fellowship partners from recent years include: 

Design & Health

  • Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality—Johns Hopkins Medicine (Design Thinking Fellow): work to integrate human-centered design into the Patient Safety Certificate Program for health care professionals.
  • Behavioral Health System Baltimore (Social Design Fellow): co-facilitate after-school workshops with Baltimore Design School students focused on opioid use and reducing underage drinking.
  • emocha Mobile Health (Social Design Fellow): design research, user experience & user interface design focused on supporting patients with chronic illnesses.
  • Greater Baltimore Medical Center (GBMC) (Social Design Fellow): work with GBMC Director of Clinical Innovation to infuse innovative thinking and human-centered design process into GBMC health system.
  • Johns Hopkins Bloomberg American Health Initiative (Social Design Fellow): work with CentroSOL program to promote equity in health for Latinos by advancing clinical care, education, and advocacy.
  • Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health (Social Design Fellow): develop Healthy for Two/Healthy for You (H42/H4U) behavioral health coaching platform to assist women at highest risk of complications in pregnancy.
  • Johns Hopkins Center for Health Equity (Social Design Fellow): utilize human-centered design to promote equity in health and healthcare for socially at-risk populations.
  • Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science & Engineering (Clinical Trial Systems Project Fellow): co-facilitate team to propose interventions for improving the current clinical trials system to bring new treatments to patients.
  • Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, Department of Community Public Health (Community Public Health Fellow): work on a pilot study designed to promote cervical cancer screening among women living with HIV in Baltimore.

Design & Innovation

  • Baltimore Impact Hub (Civic Innovation Fellow): facilitate a series of community design labs with diverse stakeholders to explore critical local issues.
  • Gensler Baltimore (Social Design Fellow): utilize human-centered design to explore the social impact oriented aspects of developing a vision and plan for the Baltimore Penn Station Development.
  • MICA Center for Social Design (Community Engagement Fellow): engage residents in redesign of public housing in Baltimore Perkins Homes development.
  • Neighborhood Design Center (Community Design Fellows): work with Village of Love and Resistance (VOLAR) to create opportunities for residents to acquire, rehab, and sell/rent property to build wealth (2019-20); to support the Signal Station North project to create a comprehensive public space lighting plan and light-based interventions (2019-20); work with a visionary community leader to develop a space for youth and families in the Duncan Street Miracle Garden (2018-19); to support the Annual Conference of the Association for Community Design (ACD) hosted by NDC in Baltimore (2017-18).

Government & Public Service

  • Baltimore Mayor’s Office of Performance & Innovation (Social Design Fellows): working with the Baltimore City Mayor’s Office of Innovation team (i-team) on a variety of challenges, including vacant housing, City cleanliness, detention centers and youth recidivism.
  • Center for Government Excellence (GovEx) (Social Design Fellow): working with GovEx team dedicated to helping governments use data to make decisions and improve people’s lives to develop a deeper understanding of the perspectives of young people experiencing food insecurity in Baltimore City.
  • The Lab @ OPM—U.S. Office of Personnel Management (Social Design Fellows): working with Lab @ OPM team to teach human-centered design across the Federal Government in order to address complex public challenges.
  • Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) (Social Design Fellow): work with the Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) MTA Chief of Engagement to utilize human-centered design to connect agency decision makers with the people whose everyday experience can help inform better decisions on transit projects across the state of Maryland.

Social Enterprise & Workforce Development

  • Made in Baltimore (Social Design Fellow): design a curriculum to train industrial sewers and machine operators for new workforce development program in Baltimore in partnership with Made in Baltimore, OpenWorks and SewLab USA.
  • Seawall (Social Design Fellow): support the work of this real estate development team on the redevelopment of Baltimore’s historic Lexington Market, to catalogue and communicate the long and important history of the market.
  • Social Innovation Lab (SIL), Johns Hopkins Technology Ventures (Social Design Fellow): provide mentoring, training and support to early-stage, start-up social enterprises in this social venture accelerator developing innovative solutions to problems in Baltimore and globally.

Climate Change, Environment & Sustainability

  • Center for Social Design (Biomimicry for Social Innovation Fellow): explore opportunities to engage designers in climate issues through ‘biomimetic’ design.
  • Civic Works (Climate Action Fellow): work with Baltimore Energy Challenge team to explore ways to collectively engage youth in mitigating climate change.
  • Johns Hopkins Mathematical Optimization for Decisions Lab (Human-Centered Design Fellow): identify and test ways to integrate human-centered design into a project exploring resilience at the interconnections of food, energy, and transportation.