Kathryn Adabonyan

About Kathryn Adabonyan

GoPursue is on a mission to close labor shortages by helping companies connect with local high schools at scale. In short, we get high school students jobs. We help these 3 customers: companies seeking to expand early talent acquisition more effectively in surrounding high schools K12 systems needing better post-secondary planning resources for career-direct students (esp. career coaches, school counselors, and CTE) high school students who are entering the workforce right after graduation The big result! Companies tap into the 40-60% of high schools graduates who enter the workforce directly. Our students are more likely to be on a path to a family-sustaining wage, and our schools have just as many resources for career-bound students as college-bound students.[How did I get started on this?] In school, I never felt inspired by the traditional subjects-English, History, Math, Science. Trust me, I was great at STEM because I won a bunch of awards. I was great at Art because I sold some pieces. But I had no idea what careers aligned to those skills. Isn\'t that sad! Engineer or Designer would have been so obvious. But you don\'t know what you don\'t know. So at the suggestion my family members, I declared a political science major. They said I was charismatic and good with people. Luckily, I scored 2 internships in local politics, and that\'s how I discovered it was NOT for me. A whole college degree down the drain! So, I graduated with a major I deemed useless. After college, I worked in K12 education for about a decade. That\'s where I realized how much K12 needs industry partnerships, and vice versa, but no great solution exists yet to bridge the gap. I\'m laser-focused on solving this same problem for students today, who are mostly turning to TikTok, YouTube, and Reddit for career research, and STILL turning to family for connections to get their first jobs. Systemically, we can do better. GoPursue is here to prove it.

Experience

1. Chief Executive Officer

   Gopursue

   Jan 2023 — Present · Washington, DC, US

Education

• Illinois Wesleyan University

  Bachelor of Arts

• Johns Hopkins University School of Education

  Masters of Science - Education

Skills

• Research
• Microsoft Powerpoint
• Event Planning
• Editing
• Management
• Curriculum Development
• Teaching
• Social Media
• Leadership
• Higher Education
• Microsoft Office
• Public Speaking