Dana Bullister

Dana Bullister is a PhD Student in Interdisciplinary Design and Media at Northeastern’s College of Arts, Media, and Design (CAMD). She is interested in combining data visualization, systems design, and communication technologies to explore tools supporting more intelligent, equitable, transparent, and responsive outcomes in policy.

She has previously worked as an award-winning data scientist, data visualization designer, technology founder, and product manager in the civic technology space. She has run for local office, where she shed light on strategies for mitigating political inequity and better channeling community insights.

She received a BA in Computer Science and Cognitive & Linguistic Sciences from Wellesley College, where she researched the influence of misinformation in online political discourse using unique coding methods. She earned an MS in Information Design and Data Visualization from Northeastern University as well as a Micromasters certificate in Data, Economics, and Development Policy from MITx.

Dana works with Dr. Brooke Foucault Welles of the Communication Media and Marginalization Lab (CoMM Lab), a part of Northeastern’s Network Science Institute, and Dr. Nabeel Gillani of the Plural Connections Group (PCG). She has also worked with Northeastern’s Burnes Center for Social Change as well as the East Boston Spatial Justice Lab.

In her free time she loves staying involved in local community initiatives, working on cool technology projects, teaching Zumba, and travel.

She is excited to explore enriching our toolsets for collective decision making, re-examining balance of influence in policy development, and better leveraging distributed insights to result in more intelligent, timely, and positively impactful social outcomes.