Going Beyond Her Role To Set a New Standard for Working Parents at Northeastern
Alison Nogueira, COE distinguished senior co-op coordinator and senior director of co-op, speaks of her experience as a co-founder and chair of NU Parents, an employee affinity group that supports over 600 working parents at Northeastern.
Alison Nogueira has dedicated her 17 years at the College of Engineering preparing students for their professional careers as a distinguished senior co-op coordinator and senior director of co-op. Her passion for encouraging students to pursue their aspirations inspired her efforts to create a community for working parents. In 2011, Nogueira and Melissa Peikin, senior director of experiential education and senior co-op coordinator for Khoury College of Computer Sciences, brought together a small group of Northeastern mothers to connect on the challenges of being a working parent. Their small group blossomed into a community of Northeastern parents across campuses who share experiences and learn from one another. She shares her experience as the co-founder and co-chair of NU Parents.
Why did you and your co-chair start NU Parents?
In 2011, my colleague Melissa Peikin, who is also co-founder and co-chair, and I started getting lunch to talk about the challenges and rewards of new motherhood and pregnancy with a few other Northeastern employees. We started inviting more new moms to join our lunches, leading to a group of about 30 women.
Then in 2016, Melissa had her second child and went out on maternity leave. Esther Cohen, senior business manager for the department of bioengineering, filled in for her and became a co-chair until 2023. She created a petition to improve maternity leave at Northeastern, which quickly took off and gained hundreds of signatures. This was the catalyst for Northeastern to create a more robust parental leave policy for all parents, not just mothers. I remember thinking that it was amazing that we were able to affect that kind of positive change.
The group really took off after that, growing to just under 100 members. And in 2019, we were formally recognized as an affinity group at Northeastern and rebranded to NU Parents to be more inclusive of all working parents. Now, our group has over 600 members.
What caused the decision to make the group an official affinity group?
Northeastern provides its employee affinity groups autonomy and funding. With that official designation, we have more opportunities for guest speakers and events. When Northeastern is recruiting to hire faculty and staff, they tell candidates that there is a community who supports working parents. It is really important for prospective faculty and staff to know that there’s a group that supports and advocates for their needs.
With such a large group, how do you keep everyone feeling connected and heard?
We hosted an annual kickoff session in January 2024 on Teams. I logged in and there were over 100 people in the session. It caught Melissa and I off guard, honestly. The group had grown to 500 by then and we realized it was becoming difficult to host smaller sessions that were valuable to all parents. So, we brainstormed an idea to create subgroups based on where people are on their parenting journey.
At present the group has over 600 members, and we have created nine subgroups each with a leader who plans events and sessions for their specific community. The subgroups help foster a smaller community feel within a larger organization. Becoming a subgroup leader is a great leadership opportunity for folks interested in progressing their careers into management or leadership. So, I feel good that I’m able to potentially help people I don’t directly supervise grow professionally.
How did the group adapt to COVID-19 and the shut down?
We had to reorient the entire community at Northeastern on how to work remotely. This was especially hard for working parents. We created a Teams channel when COVID hit, and the group exploded because parents were in chaos. People were looking for ideas for how to keep their kids busy while they worked remotely. They were also looking for support from others who truly understood how challenging it was to juggle two full-time jobs: work and childcare.
How are you adapting to the expansion of campuses?
I think what keeps an affinity group together is that people see that their needs are being heard and met. From feedback, we’ve made an effort to try and schedule our sessions in the afternoons so that those on the West Coast can take advantage of them. We have one network campus who created their own NU Parents subgroup and welcome anyone who wants a subgroup to reach out.
What are some of the most meaningful resources NU Parents provides for caregivers?
I think that the greatest resource is our general Teams channel. We have all the subgroup channels, but then we have the main channel for all members. The general channel offers so much because you can post any question and someone will know the answer to it, which I find to be really valuable. Every semester we host two sessions and each focus on a particular topic based on feedback from members.
What makes you a successful leader?
I think what makes a leader successful is being an active listener when someone is talking to you about their challenges or struggles and figuring out how to support them. Empathy, advocacy, and understanding are also very important; I recognize, especially as a parent, that people can’t possibly bring their best self 100% of the time to work. It’s the people on my team that are my top priority.
I also do my best to surround myself with people who have skills that may not necessarily be my strength. Putting together a diverse team of people to bring many perspectives into the workplace is really important.
Do you see an overlap between being the senior director of COE co-op and co-chair of NU Parents?
For a long time, I felt like I had to have all the answers. And it’s funny because that’s where my role as senior director of co-op and then my role as co-chair of NU Parents intersects. As I’ve progressed in my leadership journey, I’ve realized I don’t need to know all the answers to everything. There are many people who are so knowledgeable and have unique skillsets and allowing them to share their knowledge with also gives them the opportunity to grow and feel a sense of pride and confidence.
What is your favorite part about your roles in NU Parents and the College of Engineering?
It’s so rewarding to me to feel like I make a difference and that I am positively impacting people here at Northeastern. I advocate through NU Parents and as the senior director of co-op to help people feel supported by the Northeastern community. I find great joy in it and it’s where my passion lies.
What do you hope to see in the future of NU Parents?
We are holding a meeting to bring everyone together to recap last year and talk about this year’s goals. It’s uplifting to have a moment to take stock of what we’ve achieved as a group. We also want to gather ideas about future programming on topics of interest to members.
Melissa and I had the opportunity to appear on the Moms with Benefits podcast last June. We’re toying with the idea of trying to present NU Parents at a conference. I hope that a few people are inspired to do something similar, whether it’s at Northeastern or somewhere else. I’ve created a home here. I’m surrounded by amazing people who are so dedicated to what they do, and I am supported to grow as a professional.