Meet Alex Vipond
In 2022, Alex transitioned into a new role at BetterHelp in order to expand on his career as a front-end developer. He continues to act as an external advisor to the Kumu team.
Hi Kumunity! I’m Alex Vipond, and I just joined Kumu as the head of Customer Support & Community Engagement.
I first found Kumu when I was a teaching assistant with Rebecca Riccio, Director of the Social Impact Lab at Northeastern University. For her course on strategic philanthropy, Rebecca was looking for a tool that could help her students explore the complex, concrete impact of real-world grants that they create and award each year. Kumu, with its gradual learning curve, great design, and no-holds-barred manifesto, was the ideal tool.
I was instantly hooked, and I kept using Kumu even after the course ended. Some of my favorite personal achievements— from challenging the value of rideshare apps to geo-mapping Boston’s public transit system to nerding out on waste management—couldn’t have happened without Kumu!
As someone who uses Kumu for serious projects and silly projects, I have learned just about every feature the tool has to offer, and even hacked together a few of my own. I can’t wait to share this knowledge with all of you to make your projects look as awesome on screen as they do in your head.
When I’m offline, I like eating cheese in my home state (Wisconsin) and eating baleadas in my wife’s home country (Honduras). I also play in a band and dream of someday owning a patent, testifying in front of Congress (as an expert, not a suspect), and growing my own coffee.
Dreams aside, my lifelong goal is to help solve the world’s most pressing and complex problems, using the best science and technology available. From what I know about the Kumu team and the Kumunity, I think we share that goal.
So let’s get to work! You can email me or message me on Slack. No matter where you find me, I’m ready to tackle your questions, be they general or technical, simple or complex.
Have fun storming the castle,
Alex
