Protension

I grew up in University City, just outside of St. Louis, MO.

In May 2006 I received a Mathematics B.A. with a minor in Computer Science from Pomona College. In May 2009, I plan to graduate with an M.S. in Management Science and Engineering from Stanford University.

I like math, organization, the outdoors, education, politics, most people, and many things. I love working between customers and developers, improving resource allocation and delivery, and designing experiences. I study optimization, modeling, and the mathematics of making good decisions.

I snowboard, ski, mountain bike, and rock climb at Mammoth, Park City, the Sierras, the Winds, Hood, and soon south Tahoe. I love taking people on their first backpacking trips. I’m not bad at soccer and tennis, and I enjoy almost all sports. I want to get to know and understand everyone I meet.

For more about me, see Tom Elgin’s Resume.

Affiliations

Check out these groups. I like them.

Zane Benefits, Inc. is the company I helped build between undergrad and grad school. Transforming how Americans think about Healthcare by changing the way employers deliver healthcare dollars and the way their employees spend them (industry-leading health reimbursement arrangement administration).

The National Outdoor Leadership School taught me most of what I know about wilderness expeditioning and also how to inspire and manage tight-knit groups of people in situations ranging from idyllic to emergency. I completed a semester-long wilderness leadership course with them in Baja California during the spring of 2003. After gaining more experience (notably with the groups below), I came to Wyoming during summer 2008 to take NOLS’s Instructor Course, qualifying me to lead future NOLS expeditions like the one I went on in ‘03.

The Bus Project is the group of talented and amazing idealists I worked with in Portland before my last semester of college (Fall 2005).

On The Loose is the outdoors club serving the five Claremont Colleges in southern California. I became Director of the club my junior year of college.

Orientation Adventure is Pomona College’s program to send incoming freshmen on four-day trips to welcome them. I led Strenuous Backpacking B (Kearsarge Pass) with Laurel McFadden and Drew Foerster for 10 awesome “youngins” my junior year. I’ was a Program Coordinator the next three summers, and I led Short Canoeing B (Black Canyon) with Erin Kahle and another 10 incredible youngins in 2005.

Washington University Science Outreach promotes K-12 math and science education in the St. Louis area. I designed the website for this program when it had a staff of five, now it has many times that and serves thousands of educators a year.

Mobile Computing Lab is the group where I did computer science research for my first two summers in college. I worked on Java mobile networking code for LIME and ad-hoc coordination models.