About DFA

DFA supports daring innovators with the toolkit, connections, and values needed to approach any challenge. 

  • Five DFA interns smiling holding a DFA sign

    Developing Leadership

    DFA equips emerging leaders with human-centered design and innovation skills so they can build careers of purpose and impact - tackling complex challenges in healthcare, the environment, education, and other fields.

  • National Project participants presenting final concepts at expo

    Bringing Design Thinking to the Workplace

    Partnering with DFA means connecting with motivated, collaborative, adaptive problem-solvers who combine business strategy, product design, engineering, UI/UX, and other design services to address timely social challenges. Students get to contribute to real-world innovation while learning about organizational culture and mapping possible career paths.

black and white photo of Connie Liu, asian woman with short hair smiling wearing a striped shirt

“I wouldn’t have had the confidence to launch my own startup unless I had done Design for America. I wasn’t as nervous or scared because DFA gave me the opportunity to experiment in a controlled college environment.”

–– Connie Liu, Project Invent Founder, DFA MIT Founder.

Board of Directors

  • John N. Irwin III

    DFA Board Co-Chair

    Mr. Irwin is co-founder and Managing Partner at The Brookside Group, a private equity and investment firm. He co-founded Brookside Mezzanine and helped start two private equity firms: Clearview Capital and Brookside Equity Partners. Mr. Irwin is also the CEO of Orchard Ultrasound Innovation LLC in Sunnyvale CA. Mr. Irwin and his partners started one of the leading semiconductor plastic encapsulant firms in 1980 and led one of the early privatizations in Eastern Europe in 1991. He serves as President of the Achelis and Bodman Foundation, Chairman of the Watson Foundation Board, Vice Chair of the Fresh Air Fund, and a trustee of the Wildlife Conservation Society and the Whiting Foundation.

  • Jeanne C. Olivier

    DFA Board Co-Chair

    Ms. Olivier is a Partner at Shearman & Sterling LLC and former co-head of their Global Project Development & Finance Group. She has extensive experience in both international and domestic financings, privatizations and sovereign and corporate restructuring, primarily in Latin America. During the Latin American debt crisis, Ms. Olivier was actively involved in the restructuring of the sovereign debt of Argentina, Brazil and Panama. She is a former Executive Director of the Thomas J. Watson Fellowship. She currently serves as a Vice Chair of the Board of Administrators of Tulane University, the Chair of the Newcomb Foundation, the Secretary of the Board of Directors of the Foreign Policy Association, and a Board member of Boy’s Hope/Girl’s Hope.

  • Chris Kasabach

    DFA Board President

    Mr. Kasabach has developed thought-leading nonprofits, for-profits, and international projects in community development, education, connected healthcare, wearable computing and the arts. His work has been featured in the Smithsonian Design Museum and received two gold international design excellence awards (IDEA). He has been an invited speaker, moderator or panelist at the AIGA Leadership Summit, Harvard Kennedy School, National Science Foundation, Research Conference on Diversity and Inclusion (CUNY), SXSW, UCLA School of Medicine, the UNDP, and many other institutions around the globe. Mr. Kasabach is a Harvard Kennedy School Littauer Fellow and founding trustee of Winterhouse Institute, a council of national design educators. He currently serves as Executive Director of the Watson Foundation.

  • Stuart H. Watson

    DFA Board Treasurer and Secretary

    Mr. Watson is the founder and CEO of zFlo, Inc. a medical device and software distribution company with offices in Boston and Westbrook, Maine. Mr. Watson is the Chairman of the National Wildlife Refuge Association, a member of the Brigham and Women's Cardiovascular Research council, and a member of the Harvard School of Public Health's nutrition round table. He is a former Trustee of the Hotchkiss School and has also served on the corporation of the Massachusetts General Hospital.

  • Kristin Wisnewski

    DFA Board Member

    Ms. Wisnewski is a recognized technology industry leader focused on design, UX, research, and employee and customer experience. In addition to her Board service for DFA, she serves on the Board of Women in IT. As part of the 2021 Tech Inclusion Conference, Ms. Wisnewski was recognized as one of the Top 100 Women in Tech. She is passionate about building high-performance teams and has a proven track record of deploying DesignOps, Agile, and Objectives & Key Results at scale, as well as creating a culture of fearless collaboration and problem-solving.

  • Liz Gerber, Ph. D.

    DFA Board Member and Founder

    Dr. Gerber is Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Co-Director and Founder of the Center for Human Computer Interaction + Design at Northwestern University. She is also the Faculty Founder of Design For America. Her current research focuses on understanding how social innovators collaborate in both online and offline communities – including considerations of contemporary practices such as crowdfunding, crowdsourcing, brainstorming, and prototyping. Professor Gerber draws from her professional experience as a designer, social scientist, and manager as well as from her academic training in social psychology, organizational behavior, design, and social computing.