Board of Directors

Michael McKay ’78 is an Advisory Partner at Bain & Company, a global management consulting firm, where he helps organizations develop strategies for growth. He previously served on SSP’s Board of Trustees from 2002 to 2018, including service as Treasurer and President. He currently serves on three corporate boards and is the Chair of SSP’s Investment Committee and Reorganization Committee.

Philip Nolan ’76 is a Managing Director at Blue Delta Capital Partners. He was previously CEO of Camber Corp. acquired by Huntington Ingalls Industries in 2016. He spent 20 years at Stanley, Inc. rising to Chair, President, and CEO. He took the company public in 2006; it was subsequently bought by CGI Group in 2010. In 2007, Mr. Nolan was named Entrepreneur of the Year by Ernst & Young. He is past Chair of the Professional Services Council, the national trade association of the U.S. Federal Government’s professional and technical services industry. Prior to Stanley, Mr. Nolan served on active duty as a submarine officer in the U.S. Navy’s Nuclear Power Program. He retired as a Captain in the U.S. Navy Reserve after 24 years of service. He holds a B.S. in physics from the U.S. Naval Academy, an M.S.E. in engineering management from the Catholic University of America, and a J.D. from George Washington University’s National Law Center. He is a member of the Pennsylvania and Washington D.C. bars.

Yoonjeong Cha ‘09 (TA ’13) is co-founder and CTO of Alleo Labs, an early-stage biotech company advancing precision medicine for neurodegenerative diseases. Her work focuses on using computational models for drug discovery, and she has a decade of R&D experience in the biopharmaceutical industry. Previously, she was Senior Director of Computational Biology at Immuneering, a public clinical-stage biotech company. She has authored several publications, including papers on data analysis best practices in drug discovery. She holds a B.S. in Computer Science and Molecular Biology from MIT and has been deeply involved in science education, directing two high school programs through MIT’s Educational Studies Program (ESP) as an undergraduate.

Lauren Blum ’76 is the Chief Investment Officer of Capital Counsel LLC, a New York-based registered investment advisory firm that invests in 12 to 20 profitable, growing, well-managed mid- and large-cap publicly traded U.S. companies. She joined the firm at its founding in 1999. Before joining Capital Counsel, Lauren was a Senior Scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund where she performed the first lifecycle assessment of pulp and paper manufacturing as part of a large cooperative project with Duke University, Johnson & Johnson, McDonalds, Prudential, and Time-Life to define environmentally preferable paper purchasing practices. She was also an Associate in the Chemicals, Pharmaceuticals and Energy practice of Booz, Allen & Hamilton. She has an A.B. in chemistry from Harvard University, a Ph.D. in inorganic chemistry from MIT, and an MBA from the Yale School of Management.

Ronald Irving ’68 is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Washington. Ron grew up in New York, where his early childhood passion for astronomy was nurtured through visits with his mother to Hayden Planetarium. A gradual drift toward mathematics was completed when he was given Irving Adler’s newly published Giant Golden Book of Mathematics on his second/eighth birthday. He received an A.B. in mathematics and philosophy from Harvard University in 1973 and a PhD in mathematics from MIT in 1977, joining the University of Washington in 1981 after holding postdoctoral positions at Brandeis, the University of Chicago, and UC San Diego. At UW, Ron served as Department Chair, Divisional Dean of Natural Sciences, Interim Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, and Department Chair again. In 2002, Ron established a six-week residential program for talented high school students in the greater northwest—the Summer Institute for Mathematics at UW—which he ran for 19 years. He spent twenty years as board member and secretary-treasurer with the Astrophysical Research Consortium, whose member universities own and operate Apache Point Observatory in the Sacramento Mountains of southern New Mexico. Ron was a board member of the Pacific Institute for the Mathematical Sciences as well as board member and president of the board of the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture in Seattle. He has recently joined the board of the Simons Laufer Mathematical Sciences Institute in Berkeley.

Shannon Anderson is a SSP ’80 alum and a UC Davis Professor Emerita. She joined the Graduate School of Management in 2010, held the Michael and Joelle Hurlston Presidential Chair starting in 2017, and retired in 2022. Her research focuses on applying economic theory to performance measurement and cost control systems, particularly in strategic alliances and supply chain partnerships. Her work, supported by grants from the National Science Foundation and other organizations, has earned multiple accolades, including the American Accounting Association’s “Notable Contribution to the Accounting Literature” award and the “Notable Contribution to the Management Accounting Literature Award” three times. Anderson has served as Editor of The Accounting Review, Associate Editor at Management Science, and held visiting appointments at institutions including Harvard Business School and Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.

In retirement, she plans to teach doctoral courses internationally and continue volunteering with SSP, reflecting her enduring commitment to education and service.

Ricky Balthrop ’74 is a graduate of Rice University in Mathematics and J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School. After attending the Summer Science Program in 1974 and initially planning to become an astronomer, Ricky ultimately pursued a career in law specializing in corporations and securities law before transitioning to teaching. Despite his career path diverging from the sciences, the transformative experience at the Summer Science Program left a lasting impact on his life, emphasizing the value of pure scientific research in shaping his interests, strengths, and skills. Now retired, he continues to be involved with the program as an admissions reviewer.

Michelle Chang ’06 (TA ’11) is an engineer specializing in manufacturing and operations. She has worked across a range of industries including consumer electronics at Samsung Electronics and automotive at electric vehicle company Tesla. Currently, she works at Carbon, launching additive manufacturing factories to produce 3D printed consumer products. She holds a B.S. in mechanical engineering and a MEng in Manufacturing from MIT. She is an avid reader of fiction and enjoys everything from Jane Austen to detective novels.

Clint Chapple’s research on the biosynthesis of the plant cell wall polymer lignin has contributed to our understanding of how lignin content and composition can be manipulated in plants, a topic that has implications for the use of lignocellulosic feedstocks in industry and agriculture. Dr. Chapple attended the University of Guelph from which he received his B.Sc. and M.Sc. in botany and his Ph.D. in chemistry in 1989, after which he did post-doctoral research at Michigan State University in the Department of Energy Plant Research Lab. In 1993, he joined the Department of Biochemistry and served as head from 2008 to 2015. From 2015 to2020, he served as Director of the Purdue Center for plant biology. Chapple was recognized with Purdue’s Herbert Newby McCoy Award in 2011 and was recently inducted into the Book of Great Teachers. In 2002, he was named a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, in 2020 a Fellow of the American Association of Plant Biologists, and in 2022, a member of the National Academy of Sciences. He has served on the editorial boards of The Plant Journal, Plant Physiology, The Plant Cell, and Annual Reviews of Plant Biology.

Karen Harris is the Managing Director of Bain & Company’s Macro Trends Group and a partner in the New York office. The Bain Macro Trends Group (MTG) is the capability group for developing Bain’s insights into global macroeconomics, macro social trends and geopolitics as they impact the results of Bain’s clients.

Karen has an M.B.A. with distinction from Harvard Business School and a J.D. from Columbia Law School. She graduated with honors from Stanford University, where she received a B.A. in Economics and a B.A. in International Relations. She currently serves on the board of Helen Keller International as well as SSP International.

Eboney Hearn has served as Executive Director of the MIT Introduction to Technology, Engineering, and Science (MITES) since 2016, overseeing outreach programs through the MIT School of Engineering that create access to science and engineering for underrepresented students. She is passionate about empowering talented MITES students, demystifying the college application process, and inspiring STEM careers.

Previously, Eboney was Assistant Dean for Graduate Education at MIT and Program Director at the Broad Institute, where she led efforts to increase student diversity and academic success. Earlier in her career, she taught mathematics in Boston public schools and worked as a manufacturing engineer at IBM, co-patenting a novel photolithography process. In 2022, she received the Outstanding Contributor MIT Excellence Award.

Eboney holds a Chemical Engineering degree from MIT and an Ed.M from Harvard University. She chairs the mentoring subcommittee for MIT’s Postdoctoral Fellowship for Engineering Excellence and is a member of the MIT Diversity Think Tank and other committees. Outside work, she enjoys traveling and spending time with her two school-aged children, family, and friends.

Quinton McArthur has been the Senior Associate Director for Diversity in the MBA Admissions Office at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania since 2020. Previously, Quinton was the Director of Multicultural Recruitment and Associate Director of Admissions at MIT where he worked for nine years. He held prior positions at Rowan University, University of Maryland at College Park, The Education Trust, College Summit, and Menlo School. In total, Quinton has over 17 years of experience working in college admissions, counseling, and college access work. He holds a master’s degree in Education policy & higher education from the University of Maryland, College Park, and a bachelor’s degree from Morehouse College in psychology. Quinton is a longtime advocate for diversity and inclusion in higher education, particularly for underrepresented students in STEM. As Director of Multicultural Recruitment at MIT, he increased the pool of Black and Latinx SAT high scorers, increasing the quality of enrolled students, and enrolling the largest class of Black and Latinx students in MIT’s history. He led the design, development, and execution of a 14-day summer program called √mathroots@MIT for high achieving Black and Latinx high school students. This program continues.

Martha Oakley (AAD ’18, AD ’19-’21) is a Professor of Chemistry at Indiana University, where she has been since 1996. She has twice served as Associate Chair for Teaching and Curriculum in Chemistry, where she led the first overhaul of the undergraduate curriculum in over forty years, and she has also served as Director of Graduate Studies and Interim Director of the Interdepartmental Graduate Biochemistry Program. Since 2021, she has served as Associate Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education at IU. Her research interests are in protein structure and function. She has taught graduate and undergraduate courses and has received faculty- and student-nominated teaching awards, including the President’s Distinguished Teaching Award (2020), the highest teaching award the university offers. She is deeply involved in efforts to improve equity and effectiveness in undergraduate education in STEM, both through her role at in the Vice Provost’s office and through participation in multi-university initiatives such as the Sloan Equity and Inclusion in STEM Introductory Courses (SEISMIC) Initiative and the Bayview Alliance. She credits the Summer Science Program with changing her philosophy on grading. She has implemented a mastery-based grading approach in a section of her general chemistry course.

Miruna Oprescu ’09, a graduate of Harvard College in Physics and Computer Science and a PhD candidate in computer science at Cornell University, focuses on designing robust and equitable machine learning algorithms. Having been positively impacted by the Summer Science Program as a low-income international student, Miruna is deeply committed to promoting science education. She aims to contribute her expertise and advocate for equitable access to science education as a member of the Board of Directors.

Sid Shenai is a Venture Partner at Madrona Venture Group, where he focuses on seed and Series A investments at the intersection of AI and life sciences. He was previously CEO and Co-Founder of Proof Diagnostics, which developed a smart, portable system for the detection of disease and uncovered novel programmable biology for both diagnostics and therapeutics applications, before being acquired in 2023. Prior to Proof and Madrona, Sid was a Portfolio Manager and the Head of Developed Market Rates at Bracebridge Capital. Earlier in his career, he was a consultant at McKinsey & Company, worked with smallholder farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa with TechnoServe, and advised on financial market and fiscal policy at the National Economic Council in the White House during the Global Financial Crisis.

Sid graduated from the joint J.D./M.B.A. program at Harvard Law School and Harvard Business School and from Harvard University with A.B. and A.M. degrees in physics. He is a member of the New York State Bar Association, and he has served on the boards of several nonprofit organizations, including the Center for Excellence in Education and IDinsight.

Helen Shin ’82 is Chief Legal Officer at Stone Temple Partners in Darien, Connecticut. She earned an A.B. (joint concentration in both history & science and physics) at Harvard University, and a JD at the University of California, Berkeley. She was previously General Counsel of QP Global Family Offices, which serves ultra high net worth families, and an Associate General Counsel at The Jones Group/Nine West Holdings, specializing in corporate finance and international projects.  Before going in-house, she trained at the law firms Debevoise & Plimpton and Howard Smith & Levin. Helen has sung for over 30 years with MasterVoices, an acclaimed performing-arts group led by Tony Award-winning musical director Ted Sperling.

Karl Sun was the first parent of a Summer Science Program participant to join the Board; his son attended in 2017. Karl is co-founder and CEO of Lucid Software, creators of Lucidchart and Lucidpress. Previously, he joined Google as an early employee and led various projects such as starting Google’s patent department and setting patent and IP strategy, starting the company’s China office, and leading business development and Google’s investments in renewable energy technologies. Karl holds a B.S. and M.S. in EECS and an M.S. in technology and policy from MIT and a J.D. from Harvard Law School. He was honored as a Utah Business CEO of the Year and EY Entrepreneur of the Year in 2017.

Michael Weiss ’74 is the Robert A. Harris Chair, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Indiana University, School of Medicine. Holding 17 issued or pending patents in insulin technologies, he is a founder and Chief Innovation Officer of Thermalin, Inc. Elected to the American Society for Clinical Investigation (1991) and American Association of Physicians (2000), Dr. Weiss is a Trustee of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History and oversees its Health Advisory Committee. A former member of the White House Commission on Presidential Scholars, he is a current Trustee of the Presidential Scholars Foundation. Dr. Weiss is the past Chair of the NIDDK Board of Scientific Counselors at the National Institutes of Health.