9/18/2022

Chase McKee (Nobles ‘17) walked by the interactive touchscreen in the Morrison Athletic Center at Nobles for 6 years. The touchscreen never worked that well, but it was a very engaging concept. As a Senior in the Spring of 2017, and looking for a Senior project, Chase approached his computer science teacher, Tessy Smith (Nobles), about reengineering the Noble’s Athletic Hall of Fame touchscreen display. He was met with both enthusiasm and skepticism as the project was important and timely, but all available solutions on the market were cumbersome and very difficult to administer, thus perhaps it was a challenge too grand for a senior project.

In discussing a solution there were several key requirements: 

• A website that goes in full-screen mode on a touchscreen
• Aesthetically pleasing modern look
• Simple yet flexible design
• Extremely easy updating & upkeep
• Work on all alumni devices (phone, tablet, laptop, touchscreen) 
• ADA Accessible as a website
• Long-term sustainability 

Noble’s New Touchscreen Athletic Hall of Fame (view here) was formally introduced to the community at Senior night, where students presented their projects. While a successful senior project, Chase knew it was not yet a commercially viable product. That summer, employed as a tennis instructor, Chase spent his free time learning how to code, seeking to improve his product enough to be marketed to other schools. This process was slow, tedious, frustrating, and seemed to result in nothing but error messages…hardly a viable, salable solution. He kept working. 

Now enrolled at Colby College as a freshman, Chase entered the Business Pitch Competition with several other students; including his lacrosse teammate, Gerald Nvule (BB&N ‘15). Although the team did not win the pitch competition, it was a great learning experience, an opportunity to gain valuable feedback from the panel of Venture Capitalists, and to refine public speaking skills. The pitch can be viewed here. 

After his freshman year at Colby, Chase transferred to Brown University. Over the summer of 2020, The Brooks School, seeking a cutting edge touch screen solution for its Hall of Fame, became Rocket Alumni Solutions’ first client. Bobbie Crump-Burbank (Brooks) believed in the solution. This vote of confidence inspired Chase to persist. 

At Brown, now motivated by his paying customer, Chase built a team, consisting of several NEPSAC alumni, to completely rethink touchscreen software for schools & colleges. Now officially incorporated as a business, the team scrapped everything and started from scratch, utilizing the most modern, forward looking, and long term sustainable technology. This team has included many NEPSAC alumni: Jason Fishman (Belmont Hill ‘17), Kei Nawa (Groton ‘17), Luke Harrington (Hotchkiss ‘18), Carter Pearen (Hotchkiss ‘18), Olivia Gill (Nobles ‘18), Christopher Karlson (Milton Academy ‘14), Daniel Monahan (Nobles ‘18), Max McPherron (Nobles ‘17), Aidan Porter (Andover ‘22), Gardner Gendron (Andover ‘17), Eric Smith (Taft ‘14), Parker Mckee (Nobles ‘14), Coby Goldstein (Nobles ‘17). Brown  team members participated in several Entrepreneurial focused courses at Brown, including one led by Jonas Clark (Northfield Mount Hermon ‘00). The team benefited from the advice, guidance, and mentorship from the world’s top business, engineering, and computer science professors. 

A clear need was identified and it was obvious the Rocket Alumni Solutions team was well suited to rapidly build in the space with complimentary engineering, product design, marketing, and sales skills. 

Today, Rocket Alumni Solutions is experiencing accelerating growth, delivering the most innovative, flexible, user friendly touch screen solution for High Schools, Colleges, and Professional organizations to celebrate the most important members of their community.  As of 2022, Rocket Alumni Solutions serves over 300 institutions throughout North America and nearly all 50 states.

Rocket Alumni Solutions is excited to continue growing and maintains an “Always be launching” mentality. Each week, the team releases new features, functionality, and layouts. If a client ever requests something new, the team builds it in a week and releases it the following Sunday. Notable plans for expansion within the NEPSAC include automatic inclusion of championship history, league records and statistics, and potentially weight room records and statistics. All of this information will automatically be available on member schools’ displays. Additionally, the team is expanding its cutting edge technology to leverage the school’s efforts around admissions, recruiting, and alumni engagement. Rocket was born in the NEPSAC and will continue to innovate and bring creative solutions to serve the community.

View the NEPSAC Awards & Honors site here.