“What’s exciting about establishing the scholarship is it will help individual students and make a real impact in their lives,” says Mike Evans ’00, who received a scholarship when he was a student and knows firsthand how it can change a life.
“I was going to MIT no matter what, but I hadn’t realized that I was actually relying on the generosity of an individual to make it possible. As a junior, I had an email exchange with the donor. I decided right then that someday I would create the same opportunity for someone else.”
Evans is the cofounder and former chief operating officer of GrubHub, the wildly successful online and mobile platform for restaurant pick-up and delivery orders. GrubHub expanded the take-out food experience far beyond pizza and Chinese food by using technology to connect hungry customers to thousands of restaurants. Evans took GrubHub from an idea to start-up through two mergers and an IPO. Looking back, he says, “The best thing was, by working together, we created something of value for our customers, and created financial stability for local restaurants—20,000 small businesses across the country.”
After the completion of the IPO, Evans turned his attention to photography and writing a science fiction novel, and also reengaging with MIT. He served as a judge for the MIT $100K Entrepreneurship Competition and was a featured speaker at Start6, a workshop hosted by MIT’s Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science for student entrepreneurs and innovators. To underscore his appreciation to MIT, he recently made a gift for an endowed scholarship.
“I’m hoping to create an opportunity for someone that might not otherwise be able to go to MIT, who will then go on to do great things with their education. And I hope that one of them might continue the cycle and support the next generation of MIT students.”