Overview
Brown University had a large, willing alumni network—but no efficient way to connect current students with potential mentors. Students found it difficult to identify approachable alumni based on career interests, while alumni lacked a structured way to offer guidance. Existing tools were informal, fragmented, or lacked intentionality.
I designed a dedicated mentor-mentee platform that made it easy for students to discover, connect, and engage with alumni based on shared interests, career paths, and communication preferences. The goal was to foster long-term, meaningful connections—not just transactional interactions—through thoughtful matching, personalized discovery, and intuitive design
Research
Design
Smart Matching Interface: I designed an algorithm-informed recommendation engine that showed students 3–5 high-fit mentors each week, reducing decision fatigue while maintaining discovery.
Profile System: Crafted clean, engaging profiles for both mentors and mentees, including shared Brown-specific identity markers and mentoring goals.
Connection Flow: Streamlined the interaction to a few essential steps—profile browsing → mentorship request → optional kickoff message templates.
Mentorship Dashboard: Added a lightweight dashboard to track active conversations, completed sessions, and suggested next steps to encourage sustained interaction.
Results
Strong Adoption: Within the first semester, over 300 alumni opted into the platform, and more than 60% of active students matched with at least one mentor.
Increased Engagement: Students were 2.3x more likely to follow through on outreach compared to the prior system (which relied on LinkedIn or email lists).
Scalable Framework: The application laid the foundation for future expansion into industry-specific mentorship tracks and Brown alumni events.
