Biology and math alumna co-founds startup

While other College of Wooster juniors ponder how to start their Independent Study, Vedica Jha ’18 figured out how to start a company. What began as a conversation about life after Wooster led to Jha questioning how math majors best determine their career options. “The idea came from sports where you have talent scouts looking for individuals early on who excel in a sport, and then giving them an overview of their options as an athlete,” Jha said. “People who aren’t athletically-inclined have to figure this out on their own.” Alongside fellow math major Gio Tramonto ’18, Jha founded ProMytheUs, a “talent identification, mapping, and management platform,” in which users complete a quick assessment, and are identified with one of 27 talents. Users can then proceed to register their talent to receive two scores. “People get a Talent Quotient, a raw score of their ability in the talent, and a ProMytheUs score which correlates the answers from the test to their assigned talent,” Jha said. “For example, a personality trait like confidence applies differently to a marketing talent than it would to a math talent. It ties it back to what you’re uniquely good at, instead of assigning a list of traits without context.” Users are then able to work with the company to create a talent lifecycle plan to nurture that talent into career options or to help individuals find fulfilment in life.  
Jha worked with Wooster’s Applied Methods and Research Experience (AMRE) program and the Center for Entrepreneurship to help develop ProMytheUs. “We got a lot of support from Peter Abramo, the director of entrepreneurship, who walked us through the steps of starting a company and funding an AMRE project right after graduation,” Jha said. She also received a lot of support from professors when they learned about the company. “One of my biology professors would send me different links related to business which I thought was extremely selfless and encouraging,” Jha added. She even worked with a Wooster alumnus in the Ohio governor’s office to further her goal of identifying talent throughout the state, a major challenge but something she is used to. After first studying in India, Jha came to the United States to study biology and mathematics, ultimately becoming the first female-identifying Wooster student to double major in those subjects. In addition to working on ProMytheUs, Jha worked four jobs and participated in six different student organizations, including organizing the annual Culture Show which saw attendance skyrocket under her direction.  
Currently in a master’s program for accounting at Case Western Reserve University, Jha, appreciates how Wooster supports proactiveness. “I came here with a dream to study math and biology, but I was able to get involved with so much more because of the support from countless people in the Wooster community,” Jha said.

Posted in Alumni on February 26, 2021.