The initial list of mentors for Straight Shot‘s second accelerator class includes local entrepreneurs and subject matter-experts, along with several new mentors from across the Midwest.
These “core mentors,” announced Monday, will be involved in the day-to-day activities of the program, including steering curriculum in their area of expertise and working alongside the founding teams.
Straight Shot director David Arnold has arranged the accelerator’s curriculum to revolve around the core mentor’s expertise areas including fundraising, market analysis and customer acquisition, business management and operations, product development, and user experience. The core mentors will act as instructors and help lead weekly roundtable discussions and strategy presentations along with individual team action meetings.
“They’ll help provide insight into our class and give us a snapshot of what each company has in terms of strengths and weaknesses,” Arnold said. “That way, we can have the flexibility to prioritize who needs what where and pair them with the right folks.”
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New Straight Shot core mentors include:
Ryan Borshar, Confluence Capital (Minnesota)
Ryan Fukushima, Lightbank Capital (Chicago)
Jeff Slobotski, Silicon Prairie News (Omaha)
Dan Houghton, BuilderTREND (Omaha)
Adam Griffin, BodeeFit (Kansas City)
Matt Medlock, PaySAFE (Omaha)
Returning core mentors include:
Mark Griffis, Aviture (Omaha)
Kelly Hoey, Women’s Innovate Mobile (New York City)
Nick Bowden, MindMixer (Omaha)
Caroline Cummings, Palo Alto Software (Eugene, Oreg.)
Paul and Stephanie Jarrett, Bulu Box (Lincoln)
Michael Wetta, Dundee Venture Capital (Omaha)
Adam Nielsen, Goodtwin (Omaha)
Arnold said the other 100-plus mentors on Straight Shot’s site will still be a key part of the program and provide help in different settings and scenarios.
“They’re still extremely important to our program,” he said. “We’re leveraging off what we’ve done in the past and broadening our audience (with more mentors).”
The application deadline for Straight Shot is March 21. The accelerator second class will run from June 9 through Sept. 5, with public demo day on Sept. 10.
