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About beRecruited
beRecruited is the nation's No. 1 online networking destination for high school student-athletes seeking recruitment from college coaches and universities. beRecruited allows high school student athletes to build profiles of verified academic and athletic information, research information on universities from around the country, and reach out to college coaches. Registered college coaches can search a vast database of potential recruits and directly connect with these recruits. To date, beRecruited has over 1 million registered users, including at least one student in 80% of U.S. high schools, 68% of college coaches, over 25,000 high school & club coaches, and over 25,000 parents.
beRecruited was founded in 2000 by Ryan Spoon, a collegiate swimmer for Duke University, in an effort to make the recruiting process more efficient for high school athletes and NCAA coaches. First created exclusively for NCAA swimming and diving, in the summer of 2003, beRecruited now serves athletes and coaches from 31 different sports.
Who We Are
Vishwas Prabhakara
CEO
San Francisco, CA
What I Do: As CEO of beRecruited, my job is to make sure we connect as many qualified high school athletes to the right college coaches as possible. Whether its improving beRecruited.com, partnering with other companies to get the word out about our athletes or working closely with college coaches to make sure they have the tools they need, I'm on it! I've worked in sports and technology my whole career. Prior to beRecruited, I was co-founder and CEO of Fanvibe, a leading online and mobile sports technology company. Before that I worked in Business Development at Digg, where I lead efforts to partner with major media companies and grow revenue. I was also Director, Finance & Strategy at ESPN, where I was on the senior management team for the company's mobile efforts. I've got a BS in Information Systems and Economics from Carnegie Mellon University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Why I Enjoy beRecruited: Its really rewarding to help a student pursue higher education in a fun and affordable way. It's also important to me that beRecruited continues to be a trustworthy and transparent partner for athletes, parents and coaches.
When I'm Not in the Office You Might Find Me: Playing basketball, exploring the outdoors in Northern California, or enjoying a tasty meal with friends and family.
Art Chang
Lead Architect
San Francisco, CA
What I Do: I'm focused on making beRecruited.com the most effective site for high school athletes to connect with college coaches. Day-to-day, I focus primarily on back-end systems and web front-end interfaces. I love building powerful and scalable systems, as well as product planning and web user interfaces. I work across a number of technologies, including Ruby, Rails, Perl, CSS, HTML, Javascript, databases and real-time data. Before beRecruited, I co-founded Fanvibe, a leading online and mobile sports technology company. Before that I was a Senior Software Engineer at Yardbarker.com (acquired by Fox Sports), where we built and maintained the site and back-end, including extensive controller and server-side logic and optimization. I've got a BS in Computer Science from UC Santa Barbara with an emphasis on security and human interface development.
Why I Enjoy beRecruited: Creating a great experience for student athletes to get into college is not only an exciting challenge but also an honor. It is motivating to know that our success in creating a great product will also help high school students find opportunities that they otherwise may not have found. beRecruited is a great way that to technology to improve people's lives.
When I'm Not in the Office You Might Find Me: Taking photos, playing basketball, hanging out with friends, and exploring new restaurants.
Joe Pestro
Lead Developer
San Francisco, CA
What I Do: I build the features that users of beRecruited interact with every day. Day-to-day, I focus primarily on user experience, driving an ongoing focus on design and user experience to produce products help beRecruited's users achieve their goals. Though a generalist by training and able to work across the entire technology stack, my areas of expertise include Objective-C, Ruby, Rails, Perl, Javascript, HTML and CSS. I also spend a significant amount of time product planning in concert with the team. Prior to beRecruited, I co-founded Fanvibe, a leading online and mobile sports technology company. Before that I was a Developer at Yardbarker.com (acquired by Fox Sports), where I developed and maintained products for all aspects of the business, such as reliable systems to communicate with external vendors for statistics, photographs, authentication, and news. I have a BS in Computer Science from Miami University.
Why I Enjoy beRecruited: I enjoy the challenge of providing the best experience for the #1 sports recruiting site on the web. We have an awesome team that is always looking out for our athletes, parents, and coaches.
When I'm Not in the Office You Might Find Me: Playing basketball, on the golf course, or playing with new technologies.
Jamie Quenzer
Marketing Manager
Atlanta, GA
What I Do: As Marketing Manager at beRecruited, I lead our marketing department, covering advertising, partnerships, customer service and PR. If it affects our athletes, coaches, parents of fans, I'm involved in it! Prior to beRecruited, I interned at the United States Olympic Training Center in sunny Southern California (a great way to get started in the sports industry). I then worked at the Athletic Ticket Office at Oklahoma State University, and I now have an abundance of orange and black in my closet. I'm currently based in Atlanta. As you can tell, the World's Best Moving Company (aka my family) have been glad to see I have stayed in one place for a few years now. I graduated from the University of Nebraska at Kearney with a double major in Sports Administration and Business Administration.
Why I Enjoy beRecruited: As a high school athlete and a coach's daughter, I know first hand the difficultly of connecting college coaches to high school athletes and earning athletic scholarships. beRecruited provides a platform that provides student-athletes a starting point to put together their academic and athletic information while learning more about colleges that are a right fit for them. I'm rewarded in my job when I hear from athletes/parents that have made a commitment to a college they never had considered/heard of until they used beRecruited.
When I'm Not in the Office You Might Find Me: Attending a Good Ole' Country Concert, Watching Sports (as a Kansas girl, a shout out "Rock Chalk Jayhawk" is definitely needed), Traveling, Having Fun & Enjoying Good Company.
Tyler Bass
Designer
San Francisco, CA
What I Do: As the lead designer of beRecruited, my main focuses are usability, visualization, and functionality. Basically my job is to make beRecruited.com easy to use for a wide range of users. Navigating a site should not require a user to think, it should come naturally with no abrupt interruptions or distractions. Prior to beRecruited, I was a Designer at Fanvibe, a leading online and mobile sports technology company. Before that, I held down an array of design jobs, such as a Graphic and New Media designer at SPINearth.tv and working as a screenprint operator to get myself through college. I have a BS in Visual Communication Design from San Fancisco State University.
Why I Enjoy beRecruited: Finding a college that is right for you can be a daunting and exhausting process, especially if your dream is to play sports at a collegiate level. Helping athletes and students gain exposure and get information regarding their college future is very rewarding. Working with the team at beRecruited is always a blast and I look forward to coming in to work every day.
When I'm Not in the Office You Might Find Me: On my skateboard, eating, throwing the football around, camping, hanging with the fam, cheering on the San Diego Chargers, park-going and eating.
Board of Directors
Raymond Sozzi
Chairman of the Board
Ray is the Chairman of the Board for beRecruited. He is also the CEO and Chairman of the Board of RVS Ventures, Inc., a private equity and consulting firm. He sits on the Board of Directors of several private companies and non-profit organizations. Over the past 10 years, he has orchestrated nearly $200 million in acquisitions and public and private company financings. In 1992, he founded Student Advantage, Inc., a leading youth media and marketing company. For more than 10 years, he served as President, CEO and Chairman of the Board, charting the company's growth to more than 500 employees and nearly $75 million in revenue. Sozzi has appeared in more than 200 different publications, including the New York Times, Boston Globe, Wall Street Journal and Ad Age. He was featured by BrandWeek as a Marketer of the Next Generation and in Chief Executive Magazine as one of the top 10 up and coming CEO's in America. In 1999, Sozzi was recognized by Ernst and Young, USA Today and Dow Jones as the nation's Young Entrepreneur of the Year. Sozzi, a graduate of Dartmouth College, began his career as an associate consultant for Bain & Company.
Brent Brown
Board Member
Brent is a Managing Partner at Madison Parker Capital , a Boston-based boutique investment firm focused on partnership-oriented investments in middle market companies. Brent is active advisor, investor, and partner to his portfolio companies and has been involved with the financing, acquisition and/or sale of over 40 companies with an aggregate value of approximately $3 billion. Brent also serves on the Board of Directors of Utrecht Manufacturing, KLONE Manufacturing, Paper House Productions, IPATH Footwear, and Venyu Solutions. Brent has a BS in Engineering from the United States Military Academy at West Point, a MS in Engineering from Southern Methodist University, and a MBA from Harvard Business School. |
