Design Your Long Beach

Design Your Long Beach is a CSULB program that facilitates students’ designing their way toward careers to positively impact our local community.  We empower students to be bridges and changemakers. We work to ensure that our social impact, locally-conscious, and equitable approach to post-graduation success can reach all students whether in class, online, or in dedicated programming.

Design Your Long Beach as a program emerged from summer 2019, when then-College of Liberal Arts Associate Dean (now Interim Dean for Student Success) Beth Manke and Professor of Political Science Amy Cabrera Rasmussen were accepted to attend the Life Design Studio for Educators at Stanford University– the origin of the life design approach.  After a four-day intensive training and program development process, they brought the approach back to campus, enlisting the help of Michelle Chang (CLA Internship Specialist), and the College’s Associate Deans Daniel O’Connor and Deborah Thien, along with several key graduate and undergraduate student leaders.  Design Your Long Beach began in earnest that fall in CLA and is increasingly spreading the word throughout not only the college, but also the broader university and even into the local community.

“I was drawn to Design Your Long Beach, because it allowed me to focus beyond just a job, but to design my purpose. Before participating, I felt all over the place but with Design Thinking I was able to narrow down my interest and focus on what I want to do.”

— Alejandra Ceja, Student, Sociology

“By going to the workshops I was able to develop a university and life view and explore different career paths to reach my goal. Doing a live informational interview was also a transformative experience. I learned that making connections and learning from others is necessary to finding opportunities and that is a new skill I’ve developed and will continue to use to get further on my path.”

— Kara Castanon, Student, Communication Studies

“In DYLB I learned to have empathy for the user and be reflective about my experience. I want to be able to share my story with others, encourage them to be curious, explore opportunities and find their passion. I’m redesigning my path and my goal is to find a career that involves providing support and services to those who are going through family challenges.”

— Richard Say, Student, Sociology