Service & Advocacy

Mentor with BrownConnect+
A letter from the President

By Christina Paxson / January–March 2025
January 21st, 2025

Brown’s educational mission calls for preparing students for “lives of usefulness and reputation.” Today, comprehensive preparation for life after Brown requires supporting students as they search for internships, mentorship, and job opportunities in an ever-changing world.

In keeping with this goal, earlier this year we launched BrownConnect+, a new digital hub for Brown students, alumni, and friends that substantially enhances and deepens the ways that Brunonians on campus and around the world connect, build community, and navigate careers.

The rollout of the platform is the most recent step to sustain lifelong relationships and strengthen career development for Brunonians worldwide. It follows the 2023 launch of the Center for Career Exploration, which replaced what was commonly known as CareerLAB and significantly expanded career support through personalized advising, one-on-one mentoring, and an expansive array of experiential learning opportunities.

The new BrownConnect+ network, which combines a number of previous technologies, continues the University’s investment in supporting career exploration through facilitating connections. The platform enables mentoring relationships, provides enhanced communication and event planning tools, creates online social spaces for alumni to connect around shared interests and identities, and serves as a directory and networking platform for Brown’s community of more than 100,000 alumni.

It’s the most recent step to sustain lifelong relationships and strength-en career development for Brunonians worldwide.


BrownConnect+ makes it easier than
ever for students to build meaningful connections with alumni through formal mentoring programs, or by reaching out directly to those who are engaged on the platform. In addition to serving as mentors for current students and sharing job, internship, and experiential learning opportunities, alumni are able to search for in-person and virtual events and join communities, including regional clubs, class clubs, and career interest communities.


We have seen eager engagement already. In just a few months, more than 4,000 alumni and students have used this powerful new tool, with 500 users representing recent alumni from the classes of 2020 through 2024. Some 1,800 direct messages have been sent initiating networking conversations. And some alumni have shared that they have been struck by the enthusiastic communications they’ve received from students, sometimes within hours of sending a message.

We have been thrilled to see so many Brown alumni volunteering as mentors through this new platform, which allows students to engage with mentors in focused areas that align with their interests and backgrounds. Since the launch, we have registered 375 Women’s Launch Pad mentors, 254 career exploration mentors, and 21 military-affiliated mentors. Going forward, it will be critical to continue to galvanize a large, diverse group of alumni volunteers from a wide range of industries and backgrounds. I encourage you to consider getting involved.

BrownConnect+ is also part of the University’s commitment to fostering and supporting our diverse, global community in which alumni and students are able to develop lifelong relationships and stay connected to Brown and one another. Brunonians will first access BrownConnect+ as students and will continue to use it after graduation to access regional club and class events, alum-to-alum mentoring and networking opportunities, virtual gathering spaces, and an array of programs.

If you haven’t already explored this fantastic new resource, I encourage you to do so by visiting brownconnectplus.brown.edu.

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Related Issue
January–March 2025