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Cheyenne Dobine

Music and Communication Studies, BS
Africana Studies Minor

2021

Cheyenne wants to go into music supervision—and highlighting Black artists and POC is going to be her mission statement. To combine these two paths, Cheyenne declared a minor in Africana Studies. From her experience, she stresses the importance of building culture courses into your curriculum, as diversity is rising but still not where it should be.

Related Schools & Departments

Cheyenne ’s Path

During high school on a college trip, Cheyenne visited Northeastern's campus and was fascinated by the co-op program, making NU her top choice.

Cheyenne and Paws (entering Northeastern).

Cheyenne entered Northeastern as a Communications major.

SIS Summer Reading series (from Instagram)

During her freshman year, Cheyenne joined SIS (Sisters in Solidarity). She was able to find a longstanding community through the group throughout her Northeastern experience.

SIS Facebook
In the office of Creative License with Ray Liotta

Cheyenne completed a co-op during her sophomore year with Creative License, which inspired her to pursue a career in music supervision highlighting Black artists.

Creative License
screen grabs from Professor Jackson's class of Cheyenne.

After co-op, Cheyenne began thinking about minoring something she was interested in, and pairing that with her career path.

Image of our collective course magazine from Black Pop Culture Femme-Nomenal Magazine

Cheyenne declared her minor in Africana Studies during her third year after taking "Black Popular Culture," one of her favorite and foundational classes at NU.

Cheyenne post on WRBB

Cheyenne participated in Greenline Records and WRBB. They were great opportunities for her to get to know classmates within her major at Northeastern.

Green Line Records Website
screen grabs from Professor Jackson's class of Cheyenne.

Professor Eric Jackson's courses "The African American Experience through Music" and "John Coltrane & The History of American Jazz" allowed her to learn about traditions in music.

Eric Jackson
Title page of Cheyenne's capstone project

For her capstone, Cheyenne completed a research project on racial diversity within music supervision, allowing her to make great professional connections.

Page of Raedio from Capstone

The connections she made working on her capstone helped her compete for post-graduation opportunities at Raedio.

Raedio Website
“I identify as a Black woman and within my Northeastern experience I felt that something was missing within my curriculum and my community…if I don’t go to graduate school, I thought that this might be my last time to learn about Africana Studies, my culture, and my history, and I wanted to get that opportunity through the Africana Studies program.”

More Student Paths

Chinma Nnadozie-Okananwa

  • Law school is a big investment. That’s why Chinma was attracted to NU and the co-op process, which has allowed her to experience the legal environment before committing to the practice.
  • Chinma’s long-held love of reading and writing, specifically poetry, led to her to decision to major in English for her undergraduate education.
  • In her first year, Chinma took Early African American Literature with Professor Nicole Aljoe. It was the first time she had a Black professor and the opportunity to share lived experiences in a new way.
  • Chinma took Contemporary Poetry with Professor Eunsong Kim which explored readings that Chinma still uses today. She learned how poetry and art can affect real change, like through the Black Arts Movement.
  • Chinma is co-president of Our Voices: Women of Color, which is run through the Social Justice Resource Center and the Center for Intercultural Engagement and allows her to facilitate vital conversations.
  • Through Our Voices: Women of Color, Chinma attended Northeastern’s EMPOWER conference for students of color in 2019, where she gave a presentation about intersectionality.
  • In her second year, Chinma took Intro to Law, Policy, and Society with Professor Daniel Urman, which gave her the chance to explore the intersection between current events and law, furthering her interest...
Northeastern student Yasser Aponte works at The Food Project to help deliver fresh food to local communities in Dorchester, Massachusetts.

Yasser Aponte

  • Yasser was in the Foundation Year program at Northeastern. The program was a rigorous deep dive into core subject classes that helped Yasser bridge the gap between the high school and college experiences.
  • Initially indecisive, Yasser’s interest in traveling and experience exploring different religious texts in high school led him to a double major in international affairs and religious studies.
  • Yasser took Issues in Cities and Suburbs with Professor Erin Graves in Fall 2018. As someone deeply invested in urban life, he found the course was an enlightening look at the problems endemic to cities.
  • Yasser’s first co-op was at the Boston Beer Company as a Program Operations and Event Assistant. He worked on inventory, public relations, directed brewery events, and maintained workspace organization.
  • Yasser went on a Dialogue of Civilizations to Europe in Summer 2019 and took Engineering Principles in Nature with Professor Sandra Shefelbine.
  • Yasser implemented and maintained community gardens all over Boston on deserted plots of land during his time as the Northeastern Campus Director for the campus’ United Nations Millennium Fellowship.
  • Yasser began working at the Food Project and at a farm in Dorchester, he maintained the farm, harvested crops, distributed produce through donations and food markets, and worked on overall logistics...

Benjamin Cooper Gould

  • Cooper’s dialogue, Challenges in Coastal Sustainability, and the course Ethics and Evolutionary games with Prof. Smead have been very impactful to him.
  • As part of a class with Prof. Kelting on harm and aid he was able to write and submit real anti-racist curriculum for pre-schools in Boston.
  • Cooper has been a PPE Peer Mentor, and he has also served as the PPE representative on the CSSH Student Advisory Council for three years.
  • Cooper spent much of the summer in 2019 in Hong Kong and Malaysia on dialogue, exploring challenges for coastal sustainability.
  • Cooper has had two co-ops, the first at Boston After School & Beyond, and the second at Dynasty Financial Partners, in New York City.
  • He has conducted independent research projects with the Marine Science Center, for which he received a grant, as well as in philosophy.
  • After graduation, Cooper is hoping to specialize in education justice, first by pursuing a Master’s in Education before teaching, and ultimately going into policy...