Cohort Q, Questrom Student Pride Organization Is Revamped And Ready For The Fall Semester
June 22, 2023
Cohort Q, Questrom’s Student Pride Organization, is on a roll this summer and gearing up for an exciting start to the fall semester thanks to the initiatives of President Annie Goodridge (Questrom’24, SPH’24) and other integral executive board members such as Co-Head of DEI, Natalie Ciardi (Questrom’24) and VP of Finance Hoang Nguyen (Questrom’24) who met with us to share more details.
“You know in Mario Kart, where you press the button early so you get the boost when the race starts? That’s where we were in February, and now were ready to go.” says President Annie Goodridge, who, after attending the Reaching Out MBA (ROMBA) conference in October of last year, met the future members of Cohort Q, including Co-Head of DEI Natalie Ciardi. As first year MBA students, they spent the weekend getting to know one another and realized they shared an interest in cultivating a community for queer MBA students to get connected, feel affirmed, and have access to networking opportunities and career events hosted specifically for diversity recruitment.
GET TO KNOW PRESIDENT ANNIE GOODRIDGE (QUESTROM’24, SPH’24)
Annie says, “my early childhood revolved around Queer activism. For me it was always important to find community and have people around me who I felt like I trusted and felt valued by and cared about me.” Annie worked for the state for 4 years and was one of the three openly queer individuals in a work force of 200 and presumably to Annie, there were no opportunities for LGBTQIA+ affinity groups there.
When Annie was accepted to the MBA/MPH program, admissions reached out to say they were selected for the ROMBA fellowship. “To me it was something really exciting that my sacrifices were considered and valued; to feel like the school recognized me as a queer student and wanted me to represent the school.” Immediately, Annie knew they wanted to be involved in or lead Cohort Q.
Annie is pursuing an MBA/MPH in Health Sector Management and is studying Epidemiology, Biostatistics, and Maternal and Child Health. This summer they are an MBA intern at Vertex Pharmaceuticals and working in Health Economics and Outcomes Research Department.
GET TO KNOW CO-HEAD OF DEI, NATALIE CIARDI (QUESTROM’24)
Among this new generation of leaders, Natalie Ciardi became the Co-Head of DEI, and with the start of the Spring semester, she kickstarted her initiative by planning, and crafting monthly newsletters to cover “what’s happening with the Queer people,” as she puts it, whether it be Lesbian Visibility Month, Trans Day of Visibility and more. Natalie is working with Questrom’s Center for DEI to make sure MBAs know Cohort Q exists and is here for people who want to get involved or simply hang out and talk.
Natalie’s first memory with Cohort Q was the Nightshift Popup Brewery on the Esplanade. This is where she got oriented with the existing members and their plans to attend the ROMBA conference. The current leadership team has kept these casual meet ups rolling and they will continue through this summer. Check out their page on Questrom World to see events and sign up for their newsletter.
Natalie is a Social Impact MBA pursuing the development of seaweed-based plastics. On top of leading as the Co-Head of DEI at Cohort Q, she is the Co-Head of Social Events of SINC, the Social Impact and Nonprofit Club. This summer, Natalie is a Legislation and Advocacy Fellow at Seaside Sustainability and a Sustainable Impact Intern at Ocean’s Balance.
GET TO KNOW VP OF FINANCE, HOANG NGUYEN (QUESTROM’24)
Then, along came Hoang Nguyen who got involved in February of this year. When Annie found out about his background in finance, they recruited him as the VP of Finance and Hoang has happily served by propelling Cohort Q’s event initiatives forward. With his leadership, there will be three major events this coming semester, one career-focused, one culture-focused, and one social-focused.
Hoang is a Management Science and Social Impact MBA who is setting out to address social and environmental challenges by leveraging entrepreneurship and innovation. He has in depth experience in market research analysis and developing business models.
WHAT’S UPCOMING FOR COHORT Q?
When Annie and Natalie became Executive Board Members of Cohort Q, it took some effort to get the ball rolling. The goal for the next semester as described by Annie is to “have a giant wheel that’s already rolling downhill that the first-years can jump on.” And that’s exactly what we can expect! Here are a few major initiatives in the works for Cohort Q, this coming semester.
- Cohort Q has a new PEMBA representative, local in Boston, who will help increase community outreach event and promote awareness and DEI perspective.
- Marek Michalak Social Impact MBA (Questrom’24) and Annie are working with the Feld Center for Career & Alumni Engagement with the goal of using their network of queer people in corporate settings to increase visibility at career development events like Bites and Insights. On top of that, they’re working to bring cross-college and cross-department programming to Questrom and beyond at Boston University.
- Annie is working with admissions to establish Cohort Q’s presence and participation at orientation to show prospective students Cohort Q exists and is active.
- Cohort Q is partnering with Indiana University for a PEMBA and OMBA networking event this Spring. Cohort Q is also partnering with Questrom’s WMBAA, Women’s MBA Association to host a career networking event in the winter.
- Cohort Q’s next meet up will be at Time Out Market, on Saturday June 24th at 4:00PM. This July, Cohort Q is going to see the movie Barbie, and in August, they will host a “Welcome” get-together for first-years after the first week of orientation.
- Cohort Q will continue to attend ROMBA conferences as a group. ROMBA, Reaching Out MBA, is the biggest organization focused on supporting LGBTQIA+ MBAs through the ROMBA Conference, career and networking events, the ROMBA Fellowship, and other programming. The Questrom School of Business selects 2 students to represent each MBA class as ROMBA Fellows. Any Queer MBA student can attend the ROMBA conference and take advantage of their resources. When the future members of Cohort Q met at the 2022 ROMBA conference in DC, there were 1600+ attendees from all over the country. For more information about ROMBA, you can contact Cohort Q through email: cohortq@bu.edu.
These types of networking and career events are standard for student business organizations, but for an affinity group at Questrom step up to provide these opportunities for their members is a game changer.
Check out Cohort Q’s Page on Questrom Common here.
For Information on Reaching Out MBA, visit their website here.
