MentorPRO was co-founded by sisters Jean Rhodes and Nancy McNamara, whose interests and expertise are perfectly aligned for this mission. As a clinical psychologist, mentoring expert, and  award-winning college professor for more than 30 years, Jean deeply understands the strengths and struggles of young adults and how to apply best practices to advance students’ lives. And, as a computer scientist, Nancy knows how to harness technology to improve outcomes. After starting her career at Xerox PARC in Palo Alto, CA, where she helped to pioneer technology platforms, Nancy worked at a Cambridge-based tech startup before launching her own successful company Academic Web Pages, more than 20 years ago.

The spark that ignited MentorPRO came as the sisters were walking along the beach at the Jersey shore, where they’ve been going their entire lives. Jean had just finished writing a  book on mentoring and was bemoaning the persistently small effects and lack of focus in most programs, despite clear findings showing the value of goal-focused, evidence-based practices. Nancy asked whether technology could be leveraged to help disseminate best practices and, several years later, they are continuing to advance this idea. MentorPRO’s big break came when they were awarded a generous grant through the National Institute of Mental Health’s highly competitive Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) program. They are delighted to be working with each other, their talented team, and an expanding array of amazing partners.