Board Member, Elected 2020

AB, Dartmouth
MBA, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania

Senior Advisor, Blackstone Group

Mike retired after 25 years at Bechtel Group, a global engineering, construction, and project management company, where he held various leadership positions, including serving on the Board of Directors, chief financial officer and as president of the global civil engineering and construction business overseeing rail, roads, bridges, tunnels, aviation and hydroelectric projects.

Some of the notable projects for which he was responsible include airports in Muscat in Oman, Doha in Qatar, Las Vegas, Lima in Peru, motorways in Albania, Croatia, Romania and Kosovo, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, and rail projects in the UK, including Crossrail, High Speed 1 and West Coast Route Modernisation. Mike began his career as a field engineer at a nuclear power plant construction site, before earning an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

Mike currently serves as a senior advisor with the Blackstone Group, a private equity, alternative asset management, and financial services firm. His Dartmouth service includes Alumni Fund leadership agent (2012–present) and Admissions alumni interviewer (2016–2019, 2009–2012, 1985–1988).

Board Member, Elected 2013

AB, Dartmouth College
MBA, Stanford University

Managing Director (Retired), Gryphon Investors

Christine Bucklin retired after a career in private equity, technology and management consulting.

Most recently Christine was a Managing Director at Gryphon Investors, where she sat on the investment committee and worked closely with senior management teams of portfolio companies to drive performance. Prior to Gryphon, she served as SVP of Corporate Strategic Planning for Sun Microsystems, aligning business units with overall strategy and setting priorities during a turnaround. As COO at Internet Brands, she helped scale and diversify what was originally CarsDirect.com into a highly profitable digital media company. In her ten-plus years at McKinsey & Company, Christine served clients in many industries (health care, retail, energy, and financial services, among others) and became a partner and leader of the firm’s Sales Force and Channel Management practice.

Christine was a Dartmouth Trustee from 2001–2010. She earned an AB in mathematics summa cum laude from Dartmouth, and an MBA from Stanford. She lives in Manhattan Beach, California with her husband Randy Bucklin, a professor at UCLA's Anderson School of Management, and together they have three children.

Board Member, Elected 2019
Chair-Elect of the Board, July 2023–June 2024

AB, Dartmouth College
BE, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth
MBA, Stanford University

Managing Partner, Bain Capital Double Impact

Todd Cook serves as Managing Partner of Bain Capital Double Impact, a fund that invests in companies providing financial returns alongside social and environmental impacts. Prior to taking on this role, Todd spent 20 years as a member of Bain Capital’s North American private equity team, where he was most recently a Managing Director focused on investments in industrial and energy companies. He started his career as a consultant at Bain & Company.

Todd currently serves on the board of directors of Rural Sourcing, Inc., By Chloe, and Living Earth. He has also served on the boards of Dollarama, Dunkin Brands Group, Michaels Companies, Blackhawk Specialty Tools, TI Fluid Systems and American Trailer Works. In addition, Todd is on the Board of Cradles to Crayons.

Todd received an MBA from Stanford's Graduate School of Business in 2000 where he was an Arjay Miller Scholar. He graduated from the Thayer BE program in 1994 and graduated summa cum laude with an AB from Dartmouth in 1993 with a double major in engineering sciences and economics.

Todd resides in Wellesley, Massachusetts with his wife Beth (D'94) and their two children.

Board Member, Elected 1992

AB, Dartmouth College
BE, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth

Chairman, Hypertherm Inc.

Dick Couch is Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board of Hypertherm, Inc., a manufacturer of plasma arc and laser cutting systems. After graduating from Dartmouth, Mr. Couch was employed by Creare, Inc. as a project engineer. In 1968, he and Robert Dean (then a professor at Dartmouth and President of Creare) co-founded Hypertherm to apply ultra-high temperature technology to industrial problems. In 1971, Mr. Couch purchased the majority interest in Hypertherm and became Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board. Mr. Couch has numerous patents in the fields of plasma cutting and pollution control. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and one of the founders of Ledyard National Bank in Hanover. Since its inception, Hypertherm has grown to over 1,200 associates worldwide.

Couch and his wife, Barbara, live in Hanover and have three children: Chloe, Alexa, and Brooke.

Board Member, Elected 2020

BA, Whitman College
MS, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth
PhD, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth

Founder & CEO, Sproxil

Ashifi founded Sproxil® in 2009 and currently serves as the company’s Chief Executive Officer. Under his leadership, Sproxil developed its award-winning solutions that have been used on over 2.5 billion product units available to consumers in 6 countries to verify the authenticity of their products and earn instant rewards for their loyalty.

In 2015, Ashifi was named to Fortune’s 40 under 40 list. He was awarded the Social Entrepreneur of the Year award in 2014 by the Schwab Foundation and joined the Fast Company Most Creative People in Business 1000 community. In 2013, Sproxil was named the world’s most innovative company in health care by Fast Company, and #7 most innovative worldwide, beating 99 of the Fortune 100 companies. Most recently, he has been picked as a finalist for the 2020 Global Business Hall of Fame presented by JA Worldwide.

Ashifi served on the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Social Innovation and on the Meta-Council on the Illicit Economy. He holds a US Patent and earned a PhD in engineering from Dartmouth, where he delivered the 2020 alumni remarks at Investiture. Ashifi holds a BA in mathematics and physics from Whitman College. He was Whitman’s 2018 commencement speaker and received an honorary doctorate. He is Dartmouth’s first-ever PhD Innovation Program Fellow and teaches an executive seminar and a course in New Business Ventures Technology Management at Columbia University.

Ashifi volunteers for the Whitman College President’s Advisory Board.

Board Member, Elected 2018

AB, Dartmouth College
MBA, Stanford University

Partner, Iconiq Capital

Will Griffith is a Partner at ICONIQ Capital and a founder of ICONIQ Strategic Partners, ICONIQ’s growth equity investing platform, which is focused on partnering with exceptional founders and leaders to effect global impact and change. Will is particularly passionate about partnering with product / customer first entrepreneurs to help them achieve their vision. Since its founding in 2012, ICONIQ has emerged as the partner of choice for best in class technology companies and employs a distinctive ecosystem to magnify global impact and support a new generation of entrepreneurs and companies. Representative investments include Alibaba, Adyen, Airbnb, Alteryx, Datadog, Flipkart, HashiCorp, Pluralsight, Red Ventures, Snowflake, Uber, Wayfair, Wolt and Zoom. Will is currently a director of Age of Learning, Blackline, People.ai, Procore, ServiceTitan, Truckstop, and Virtru.

Will also co-founded IPI, ICONIQ’s data center real estate investment platform, and manages and oversees ICONIQ’s private equity, venture and other direct investing activities. Prior to joining ICONIQ, Will was at Technology Crossover Ventures where he was a General Partner for nine years. He started his career at Morgan Stanley and also worked at The Beacon Group, a private equity firm that was acquired by JPMorgan Chase.

Will graduated from Dartmouth in 1993 where he double majored in engineering sciences and history and played football on a three-time Ivy League Championship team. He earned an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business in 2000 and currently is a Director on Stanford Business School’s Management Committee. Will lives in Atherton with his wife, Calla, and their three children.

Board Member, Elected 2021

Bachelor of Technology, Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur
PhD, Ohio State University

Nemirovsky Family Dean, University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering & Applied Science

Vijay Kumar is the Nemirovsky Family Dean of Penn Engineering with appointments in the Departments of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics, Computer and Information Science, and Electrical and Systems Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania. He received his bachelor of technology from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur and his PhD from Ohio State University in 1987. He has been on the faculty in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania since 1987.

In addition to holding many administrative positions at Penn, Kumar has served as the assistant director of robotics and cyber physical systems at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (2012–2013). His lab has founded many startups in robotics, and he is a co-founder of Exyn Technologies. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). He was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 2013 and the American Philosophical Society in 2018.

Board Member, Elected 2021

BE, Zhejiang University
ME, China Academy of Railway Sciences
PhD, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth

President, LinkedIn China

Jian Lu is Corporate Vice President at LinkedIn, and President of LinkedIn China, overseeing LinkedIn’s R&D and entire business in China. He has over 25 years of experience in leading technology and business innovations in Silicon Valley and China.

Jian started his career in the hi-tech industry as a technologist at Apple in 1996, and led the technology development in image and video coding for the first generation of Apple’s streaming media products. In 2006, he left Apple to co-found Vobile in Silicon Valley and served as CTO through 2010. His invention in video fingerprinting and identification has become a key technology widely adopted by the Hollywood studios and the entertainment content industry in anti-piracy as well as monetization.

He returned to China in 2010, becoming VP of Multimedia Technology and Managing Director at Shanda Innovations, Beijing. During the past decade of working in China, he served as CTO at Ku6 Media, CTO of 360 Video and GM of 360 Live Cloud at Qihoo 360. He was also a partner and CEO of CCtalk platform business unit at Hujiang EdTech in Shanghai.

Genuinely caring about the business and professional communities, Jian serves on the Board of Governors at American Chamber of Commerce in China, an American business community with nearly 1000 corporate members. He also spends a lot of time mentoring students, professionals, and entrepreneurs.

Board Member, Elected 1974
Chair of the Board, 1982–1984

AB, Dartmouth College
MS, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth

Chairman, MacLean-Fogg Co.

Barry MacLean joined MacLean-Fogg Company in Mundelein, Illinois, in 1961, became Chairman in 1972, and served as CEO from 1972–2017. MacLean-Fogg is a leading manufacturer of products for the automotive fasteners, commercial truck and trailer, and wheel and axle mounting industries and of products for electric utility, telecommunications and civil markets, with 30 North American manufacturing facilities, 10 international facilities, annual sales of nearly $800 million and a worldwide workforce of 4,500 people.

MacLean is a member, director, and former chairman of numerous businesses and professional organizations. Civic interests include Trusteeships at Newberry Library, Museum of Science and Industry, University of Chicago Hospitals, and U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association. He is former Chairman of the Board of The School of The Art Institute and Vice Chairman of the Art Institute. He served for 35 years as elected trustee of the Village of Mettawa and 14 years as mayor.

MacLean graduated from Dartmouth in 1960, and earned a master's degree from Dartmouth's Thayer School of Engineering in 1961. He is a former chair and current member of the Thayer School Board of Overseers, originally elected in 1974. He was also a Trustee of Dartmouth College from 1991 to 2001. Additionally, he was chairman of the Thayer portion of Dartmouth's Will to Excel Campaign in the 1990s and co-chair of Thayer's Partners in Innovation Campaign, which was part of the recent Campaign for the Dartmouth Experience. MacLean was named a Sylvanus Thayer Fellow in 1979, received the Robert Fletcher Award in 1989, the Dartmouth College Alumni Award in 2007, and an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from Dartmouth in 2010.

Board Member, Elected 2022

AB, Dartmouth College
BE, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth

Senior Partner, Evidence, Value, Access & Pricing (EVAP), Trinity Life Sciences

Monica A. Martin de Bustamante's career has focused on global pricing and market access issues for biopharmaceutical and pharmaceutical products, and has extensive experience working across major therapeutic areas (oncology, cardiovascular, neurology, metabolic, autoimmune, gastrointestinal, respiratory, etc.) to collaborate on products from early development, to launch, and through their lifecycle. She has extensive global experience in early and late-stage pricing, market access strategies, value proposition development, lifecycle management, generic or biosimilar erosion counterstrategies, and patient support programs. Much of her work to date has centered around understanding the barriers to access and reimbursement challenges posed by evolving healthcare systems and evidence requirements.

Prior to Trinity Life Sciences, she was the CEO & Managing Director of CBPartners, a boutique consulting company she co-founded in 2012 and sold to Trinity Life Sciences in October of 2021.

Monica also serves on the board of Angeli Parvi, a non-profit focused on providing early-stage seed investments and mentorship to Dartmouth entrepreneurs with the goal of giving back to the Dartmouth community and growing our entrepreneurial footprint.

Board Member, Elected 2000
Chair of the Board, 2008–2020

BS, Hobart College
MS, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth
MBA, Harvard Business School

Founding Partner, Polaris Partners

As a founding partner of Polaris Partners, Terry McGuire brings more than 35 years of successful early stage investing experience in medical and information technology companies.

Terry has invested in more than 50 companies. He co-founded Inspire Pharmaceuticals, AIR, and MicroCHIPS. Companies Terry has supported have touched more than 60 million patients and saved over 400,000 lives.

In 2015, Terry was listed as one of Scientific American’s Worldview 100, visionaries who continue to reshape biotechnology and the world. Terry was listed in Forbes’ Midas 100 List of Top Tech Investors multiple times, and was chosen to receive the Irish America Healthcare & Life Sciences 50 Award. He is a recipient of the Massachusetts Society for Medical Research Award, and the Albert Einstein Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Life Sciences, awarded by Harvard and the City of Jerusalem. In 2017, Terry was recognized by Women in the Enterprise of Science and Technology (WEST) for his contributions to promoting gender parity. He was awarded honorary doctorate degrees from Ohio Wesleyan University and Canisius College for his work in translational science.

Terry was former chairman of the National Venture Capital Association. During his tenure he testified before the US Congress on issues related to financial regulation. Recently, Terry was awarded the NVCA’s Outstanding Service Award in recognition of the extraordinary amount of time, resources and dedication to association efforts he has spent that in turn benefits the entire venture industry.

In addition to Thayer, Terry sits on the boards of MIT’s The David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, The Arthur Rock Center for Entrepreneurship at Harvard Business School, and The Healthcare Initiative Advisory Board (HBS). He serves on the Strategic Advisory Board of the Brigham & Women’s Hospital.

In 2009, Terry helped create the Global Venture Capital Congress (GVCC), a gathering of venture capital leadership from around the world. For the past ten years Terry has chaired the congress. The GVCC has worked to create cooperation among venture capital associations in areas as diverse as public policy, research and strategic topics including diversity and inclusion, taxation, and the global image of venture capital and private equity.

Board Member, Elected 2021

BA, Dartmouth
MBA, Ross School of Business, University of Michigan

Co-founder & Managing Partner, Carleton McKenna & Co.

Christopher McKenna is co-founder and managing partner at Carleton McKenna & Co, a boutique investment bank serving lower middle market, specialty manufacturing, service and technology companies. Chris previously acquired a Cleveland manufacturing business where he was president and CEO, and, prior to that, was director of financial analysis with MacLean-Fogg Company in Chicago helping execute financial transactions and acquisitions, and managing a business unit.

Chris received his BA in Economics from Dartmouth and his MBA with High Distinction from the Ross School of Business at University of Michigan (including Tauber Institute for Global Operations, a joint venture with the College of Engineering). Chris currently serves on the Executive Committee for The Center for Health Affairs and as Board Chair for their for-profit subsidiary CHAMPS, as well as being Board Chair for the Holimont Ski Resort. Chris and his wife Laura are avid skiers and have passed that love on to their four children.

Board Member, Elected 1990

AB, Dartmouth College
BE, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth
ME, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth

President & Owner, Nearburg Producing Co.

Founding Nearburg Producing Company in 1979, Charles grew it into one of the Top 100 Independent Producers in the U.S., and always operating in an environmentally conscious way, received two Environmental Awards from the Bureau of Land Management. In 2016- 2017 Nearburg sold its oil and gas operations to two firms backed by private equity.

Nearburg has also restored significant trout habitat in New Mexico, and at Broadacres Ranch in Creede, Colorado, where he employs numerous Dartmouth students as guides and ranch hands each year. Nearburg also owns STOL Aviation, which is developing the Arctic Tern, a world-class “backcountry” short take-off and landing airplane, and Nearburg Racing which prepares vintage Formula 1 cars and land speed vehicles for competition. These activities have generated numerous engineering projects for Thayer School students. He is also a minority owner and advisory board member of McLaren Racing LTD, a top UK-based Formula 1 and Indy Car Team.

In honor of his son, Rett, who lost an 11-year battle with Ewing’s at age 21, Charles devotes substantial time and resources in support of Ewing’s Sarcoma cancer research and was instrumental in founding the Rett Nearburg International Ewing’s Sarcoma Research Symposia.

A lifelong racecar driver, his career took him to the highest professional level in the United States when he drove the late Walter Payton’s Indy Car in the 1997 CART/FedEx Championship. His career also includes driving a 333SP Ferrari at Le Mans and finishing 4th and 10th overall at the Sebring 12-Hours.

Charles is one of only six people in history to have set a piston engine land speed record at over 400 MPH. In September 2010 at the Bonneville Salt Flats driving the “Spirit of Rett” streamliner, Charles set a 414 MPH FIA record with a top speed of 422 MPH. This made the “Spirit of Rett” the fastest single-engine normally aspirated car in history, as well as the 3rd fastest internal combustion engine car in history. The “Spirit of Rett” was designed and built at Nearburg Racing in Dallas.

An engineering/studio art major at Dartmouth, Nearburg was also a 3-year varsity letterman as a member of the Lightweight Crew and won the Marshall Robinson Award. Among many Alumni activities Nearburg has served on the Board of Advisors at the Thayer School of Engineering for over 30 years; served as Vice-Chair of the Executive Committee of the Campaign for the Dartmouth Experience from 2003-2009; is a Steward of the Friends of Dartmouth Rowing; served on the Board of Overseers at the Hood Museum of Art, and is a current member of the President’s Leadership Council. Nearburg has mentored the student-run Dartmouth Formula Racing Team since its inception in 1995. In 2007 his service to Dartmouth was recognized when he received the Dartmouth Alumni Award.

Charles is also a Trustee of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Foundation, the Petersen Automotive Museum—Los Angeles, the Art Center College of Design—Pasadena, and a Life Trustee of the St. Mark’s School of Texas—Dallas. He is a past Trustee of the Maryland Institute College of Art–Baltimore, The Hockaday School–Dallas, and the Hood Museum of Art—Dartmouth College.

Nearburg has a daughter, Anna ’10, and stepsons Forrest and Graham Miller. He is married to Karen Spencer Miller, who is on the Board of Advisors at the Hood Museum of Art and is the daughter of retired Dartmouth Professor of Chemistry, Thomas Spencer.

Board Member, Elected 2018

AB, Dartmouth College
BE, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth
MBA, Harvard Business School

Christy Nicholas has been an active volunteer for Dartmouth, serving on the Thayer School Annual Fund Executive Committee, Dartmouth Centennial Circle, and the Alumni Fund Committee. While at Dartmouth, Nicholas was awarded a Luce Special Graduate Fellowship, an award aimed at encouraging promising women to pursue engineering careers as well as a Rockefeller Fellowship for social entrepreneurship. She earned her AB from Dartmouth, her BE from Thayer, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Board Member, Elected 2019

AB, Dartmouth College
BE, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth
MS, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Founding Partner, Blue Road Capital

Luis Paz-Galindo is a founding partner of Blue Road Capital, a private equity firm focusing on investments in the agricultural sector. Prior to founding Blue Road in 2014, he was a member of the investment team of Ospraie Advisors, LP, the investment manager of the Ospraie Special Opportunities Fund, from 2006 to 2013 focusing on private equity investments in the agricultural and energy sectors. He began his career at JP Morgan in 1999 where he was an associate in the Mergers & Acquisition group from 1999 to 2000 and a principal with JP Morgan Partners, the private equity division of JP Morgan, from 2000 to 2006 in the São Paulo, Brazil, and New York City offices.

Luis received an AB in philosophy and engineering sciences (Summa Cum Laude) from Dartmouth in 1993, a BE from Thayer School in 1994, an MS in technology and policy in 1996 and a PhD in technology, management and policy with an emphasis in energy economics in 1999 from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Board Member, Elected 2023

BA, Colby College
BE, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth
MEM, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth

General Partner, ICONIQ Growth

Seth Pierrepont is a general partner at ICONIQ Growth where he joined in 2022 to launch the office in London. ICONIQ Growth is a global growth equity platform focused on partnering with exceptional entrepreneurs and leaders who drive global impact and change from early growth stage to IPO and beyond. Representative investments from its portfolio include Adyen, AirBnB, Alibaba, Alteryx, BambooHR, Braze, Coupa, Datadog, Docusign, Gitlab, Marqeta, Miro, Procore, ServiceTitan, Snowflake, Uber, Wolt, and Zoom, among others. Seth joined ICONIQ Growth after spending close to a decade as a partner at Accel investing in early and growth stage technology companies across Europe and Israel. He started his career in San Francisco as a consultant at Oliver Wyman.

Seth graduated from Thayer in 2007 with his Bachelor of Engineering (BE) and Master of Engineering Management (MEM) degrees. He completed the Partner School Dual-Degree program between Dartmouth and Colby College, majoring in mechanical engineering and mathematical sciences. He was also on the Dartmouth Formula Racing team as co-captain. Seth has previously served a term as a member of Thayer's Dean's Council. Seth lives in London with his wife, Camilla, and their three children.

Board Member, Elected 2016

AB, Dartmouth College
MBA, Anderson School of Business, University of California, Los Angeles

Founder & Portfolio Manager, Aperimus Capital, LLC

Located in Marina Del Rey, California, Aperimus focuses its research efforts on companies in financial distress. Aperimus manages portfolios of investments based on this research, primarily in the US equity markets, on behalf of a group of institutions and family offices. Following a career in environmental engineering in Washington, D.C. and Telluride, Colorado, Catherine began her investment career in 2000 at Barrington Partners, an investment fund in Santa Monica, California. As a managing director, she focused on analyzing companies in financial distress.

In 2005, Catherine joined Atlas Capital, an investment fund based in Dallas, Texas. As a principal, she was responsible for idea generation, research, and trading for a segment of the fund's equity portfolio. She left Atlas to found Aperimus in December 2008. Catherine earned an AB in engineering sciences from Dartmouth in 1993 and an MBA focused on finance and accounting from the Anderson School of Business at UCLA in 2000. She guest lectures at the Anderson School on finance and accounting.

Chair of the Board, 2020–present
Board Member, Elected 2015

AB, Dartmouth College
BE, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth
MBA, Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth

Chief Executive Officer, Upstream Bio

Samantha Truex is CEO of Upstream Bio. Sam has served in leadership roles at multiple venture-backed companies including as CEO of Quench Bio, COO of Synlogic and CBO for Padlock Therapeutics. Previously, Sam was vice president of corporate development at Biogen where she led transactional business development activities and served as program executive for now-marketed products FAMPYRA®, ELOCTATE™ and ALPROLIX™.

Sam also previously worked in corporate development at Genzyme, Chiron Diagnostics and Health Advances. Sam earned an AB in biology from Dartmouth, a BE in biomedical engineering from Thayer and an MBA from Tuck. Sam is also on the boards of Thayer, Life Science Cares, and Atrios. Sam has previously served terms on Dartmouth's Alumni Council and Thayer's Corporate Collaboration Council.

Board Member, Elected 2022

AB, Dartmouth College
MEng, Cornell University
MBA, Harvard Business School

Co-founder & Managing Partner, Growth Catalyst Partners, LLC

Jim TenBroek is a managing partner at Growth Catalyst Partners, the private equity investment firm that he co-founded in 2016, building businesses in the data, information and marketing services sectors. Jim has been a private equity investor for over 25 years and has led the investment of over $1B of equity capital in over 30 companies.

Prior to his investing career Jim was an electrical engineer at Hewlett Packard's Medical Products group developing cardiac ultrasound systems, before moving into management. He is the former chairman and current executive committee member of the Illinois Venture Capital Association (IVCA), which includes as members over 80 of Illinois' largest private equity and venture capital investment firms.

Jim received an AB in engineering sciences (magna cum laude) and received the Colligan Prize for materials science from Dartmouth in 1983. Jim lives in Illinois with his wife Sara (whom he met at Dartmouth) and their two children.

Board Member, Elected 2021

AB, Dartmouth College
MBA, Stanford University

Founder & Executive Chair, Copia Global

Tracey is a successful serial entrepreneur and seasoned business executive who has held leadership roles in social businesses and emerging markets for more than 25 years. She is particularly passionate about using the best of capitalism, the sharpest tool in the shed, to end global poverty.

Currently Tracey serves as Founder and Executive Chairman of Copia Global, which is bringing mobile commerce to the Base of the Pyramid starting in East Africa. In 2005 she founded and served as CEO of MicroPlace, a web-based brokerage service for everyday people to make social investments around the world. MicroPlace was acquired by eBay. Prior Tracey was part of the founding team and served as CFO of KickStart International, an organization that designs and sells products to low income people in Africa. And in 1998, she started her first company, 4charity, a for-profit technology company serving NGOs, where she served as Founder and CEO.

Tracey is a regular speaker at conferences and in the media. Her numerous leadership awards include Top 25 Women of the Web Award, San Francisco Business Times Leadership Award and a Working Woman Magazine Entrepreneurship Award. In her free time, Tracey is the personal taxi driver for her 3 children, worships at the altar of Steinbeck, serves as personal chew toy for Lily the Pupinator, cheers for Tottenham and squeezes in an Ironman or marathon whenever she can. Tracey holds a degree in engineering and economics from Dartmouth College and an MBA from Stanford Business School.

Board Member, Elected 2021

AB, Dartmouth College
BE, Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth
MPAff/MSE, University of Texas at Austin

Board President, The Powell Foundation, Houston, TX

Katherine Osborne Valdez is Board President of The Powell Foundation in Houston, TX which focuses on K-12 public education grantmaking in three counties in Texas. She previously served as a Foreign Service Officer with the US Agency for International Development, a water resources engineer, and a Peace Corps Volunteer. She continues to consult in these spaces.

Wherever 'round the girdled Earth she roams, Katherine has been an admissions ambassador, most recently serving as the Admissions District Enrollment Director for Brazil. Katherine received her AB and BE degrees from Dartmouth and Thayer School of Engineering. She earned masters degrees in both public policy (MPAff) and environmental and water resources engineering (MSE) from the University of Texas at Austin. She currently lives in Brazil with her husband and two children.