Team - StudentMentor.org

Ash Jafari

Ash Jafari is the Co-Founder of StudentMentor.org. Through his leadership, StudentMentor.org has grown to unprecedented levels. Ash was invited to The White House to meet the President and talk to White House officials about StudentMentor.org’s role in improving college completion and preparing students for the workforce of tomorrow. As a result, StudentMentor.org and The White House launched a partnership in 2012 to bring more light to this critical issue. He brings more than 10 years of product management experience, building products that generate in excess of $100M in annual revenue. Ash received his MBA from U.C. Berkeley Haas School of Business where he was named a Dean’s Scholar. He started college at 16 and graduated in the top 1% with a B.S. in Finance from Santa Clara University.
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Stephanie Bravo

Stephanie Bravo is the Co-Founder of StudentMentor.org. Stephanie was invited to The White House to meet the President and talk to White House officials about StudentMentor.org’s role in improving college completion and preparing students for the workforce of tomorrow. As a result, StudentMentor.org and The White House launched a partnership in 2012 to bring more light to this critical issue. Previously, Stephanie was the Founder and President of Making a Difference for Good USA, which provided thousands of rural Cambodians with clean water, adequate sanitation, and education. Stephanie was chosen as one of the top 100 most influential women in Silicon Valley in 2013. She is also a Fellow of the National Hispana Leadership Institute and a Hispanic Scholarship Fund Scholar. She is a first-generation college graduate earning a M.A. in Education Policy, Organization, and Leadership from Stanford University and a B.A. in Psychology with honors from San Jose State University.
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Arash Nasibi

Arash Nasibi is the Chief Information Officer at StudentMentor.org. He grew up in Sweden and came to the states at age eleven. Despite this, he started college at 16 and obtained a B.S. degree in Computer Science from University of California, Los Angeles followed by a MBA from the UCLA Anderson School of Management. He was also awarded a UC Regents scholarship. Throughout his college tenure, Arash used the counseling and mentoring services available to obtain grants, internships, and a strong academic record. Arash has a background in technology consulting and has also run his own tutoring company. In addition, Arash has been active with various Junior Achievement programs by teaching basic personal finance, business, and economics principles to middle and high school students. Having greatly benefited from mentoring, Arash is excited to give back to college students through StudentMentor.org.

Richard To

Richard To is the Lead Developer at StudentMentor.org. He has a B.A. in Creative Writing and an A.S. in Internet Technology. He is an avid supporter of non-profits and the causes they are devoted to, especially education. He has done volunteer work for Pacific Autism, CET Immigration and Citizenship Program, Just Read, and Reading Partners. Becoming a reading tutor for elementary school students is one of his most rewarding experiences, and he recommends it to anyone who can spare an hour or two a week. Richard is happy to be part of the StudentMentor.org team.The potential of education to change lives is something Richard believes in. It is like thinking the world is round even when faced with a square map.

Viktor Petersson

While still in college Viktor Petersson co-founded the software factory WireLoad, which grew into a thriving business. In 2013, Viktor took a break from WireLoad and joined CloudSigma to head partnerships and business development. In early 2015, Viktor rejoined WireLoad as the CEO to support the company’s latest product, Screenly. Today, Screenly is the most popular digital signage solution for the Raspberry Pi powering over ten thousand digital signage screens around the world (including a large deployment of digital signage in education).

Aaron Bazin

Aaron Bazin consults on contingency mitigation planning and organizational assessments for StudentMentor.org. His experience is focused in the government sector and he has worked for U.S. Military for the past 15 years. His specialty in that capacity is strategic planning and policy development and has been focused primarily on the contemporary issues facing the Middle East region. He has worked on numerous projects leading small teams of subject matter experts to develop unique solutions to complex and wicked problems for high-level decision makers. Aaron holds a MBA and is currently working as a consultant / mentor with StudentMentor.org to fulfill his practicum requirement for completion of his Doctorate in Organizational Psychology.

Mike Palmieri

Mike Palmieri is the Program Specialist for StudentMentor.org, and also serves as a mentor with us. He works with the Evaluation team to assess program effectiveness, and to develop new ideas and solutions to achieve our goals of student college completion and career readiness. Currently, Mike is the Director of Retention and Student Success at Notre Dame de Namur University, a Hispanic-Serving Institution. Through a Title V Program, he works with faculty, staff, and students to enhance and develop retention strategies, with a focus on Hispanic, low-income, and/or First-Generation college students. Mike has also held Student Affairs positions at San Jose State University, University of South Florida, Adelphi University, and New College of Florida. He is dedicated to working with students regarding personal and professional development goals, including one-on-one counseling and group advising on a variety of topics such as career exploration, personal finance/budgeting, and time management. Mike has a M.Ed. in College Student Affairs, and a Graduate Certificate in Career Counseling, both from the University of South Florida. He also has a B.A. in Psychology from New College of Florida.

Alex Shebanow

Alex Shebanow is the Media Director at StudentMentor.org. He is an award-winning filmmaker who started his career making documentaries on non-profits around the San Francisco Bay Area. He believes that films can be used to raise awareness for a wide-ranging array of topics and can be used to better society itself. Besides working on documentaries and videos for StudentMentor.org, his other documentary work includes films on Autism Spectrum Research Alliance, Bay Area Outreach and Recreation Program, and A Better Place Foundation. He loves to tell stories and finds documentary storytelling an incredibly rewarding experience. Alex is currently finishing his undergraduate degree in Creative Writing from the University of Southern California.
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David Shapiro

David Shapiro is the front-end and UI architect for StudentMentor.org. He brings over 15 years of web development, software engineering and IT administration experience to the team. He has worked for some notable Internet pioneers including Netscape, Sun Microsystems, and Infoseek, as well as, a handful of successful and not-so-successful start-ups. For the last 10 years Dave has focused his efforts exclusively on providing the latest web technology to the non-profit sector including five years as a web developer and account director with the Taproot Foundation. Dave is a graduate of UC Berkeley, and serves on the Mid Peninsula Boys & Girls Club board of directors. He is also a licensed private pilot and avid rock climber. Follow Dave on GitHub

Kousha Najafi

Kousha Najafi is a technical consultant, bringing over three years of professional software engineering experience to StudentMentor.org. A native of Orange County, CA, Kousha received his B.S. degree in Computer Science and Engineering from University of California, Los Angeles. Upon completion of his studies, he began his career as a Software Engineer at Google, Inc., focusing on speed, scalability, and reliability. Kousha relishes the fast-paced and quick-thinking environment that comes with keeping Google running, and has fine-tuned the necessary skills for troubleshooting the most complex situations. He is excited to apply his technical skill sets to optimizing the potential of StudentMentor.org.

Danielle Lafontaine

Danielle Lafontaine is the Marketing Specialist for StudentMentor.org and lead Copywriter at Verecloud, Inc., a Denver based Cloud app store for businesses. Previously Danielle was a freelance advertising copywriter and owner of Dynamic Marketing Resources, located in Huntington Beach, CA. Danielle has an advertising agency background and has worked on the media, creative and production sides in both general and legal industry-specific agencies. She has written TV and radio commercials, web content, marketing collateral, public relations articles and press releases for companies in myriad industries. As owner of D.M.R., Danielle focuses on web and print content development, social media campaign planning and execution, and public relations. Danielle is a graduate of the New England School of Communications located in Bangor, Maine and holds a B.S. Degree in Marketing Communications.
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