Within higher education, a need exists for learning designs that facilitate education and support students in sharing, examining, and refining their critical identities as learners and professionals. In the past, technology-mediated identity work has focused on individual tool use or a learning setting. However, we as professional learning designers sought to explore designs that support critical identity processes across various learning contexts, media, and tools. We have identified the recurring and intertwining themes of visibility, agency, community, competencies, and narrative based on a literature review and professional practice. Along with the exploration of these themes, a design framework that encompasses a set of identity-centered design elements and principles is presented along with self-reflective critical questions intended to aid in design, development, and implementation of online collaborative learning environments. This framework is then applied to a case study to demonstrate how the elements, principles, and critique can be used to understand and evaluate new and preexisting designs.