Meet the connector.
For 30 years, Tonya Witherspoon has been building at the intersection of technology, workforce, and infrastructure — often years before the rest of the market caught up.
Tonya Witherspoon
Tonya has spent 30 years doing this work from inside institutions — Wichita State University, NetApp, LSI Corporation, ESSDACK, and multiple companies she founded. She helped build Kansas's first carrier-neutral IXP. She co-founded the WSU Molecular Diagnostics Lab. She scaled university-industry partnerships to 700+ employers, contributing to WSU's #1 U.S. ranking in aerospace engineering R&D. Earlier, she led the digital transformation of WSU's Media Resources Center — moving television and radio to streaming years before it became standard.
MindScapes is the vehicle Tonya built so this work doesn't have to live inside one institution anymore. The current firm continues a thread first started in 2007, when Tonya founded the original MindScapes as a digital media, esports, and technology training center. Same mission. Larger scope. Thirty years of relationships.
"I'm a connector. I see the layers others can't, and I bring the right people to each one. That's been the through-line of my entire career."
Tonya is a featured speaker at the Rockefeller Foundation's Big Bets for America alongside Rajiv Shah, Heartland Forward President Angie Cooper, governors, and senior leaders from Google.org and Boeing. She has testified before the White House Domestic Policy Council and the Kansas State Legislature. She's a published author of more than a dozen books on technology and education, a recurring contributor to Broadband Breakfast on national infrastructure policy, a member of and speaker for Wichita Women in Tech (WIT), and was a long-tenured mentor with Women Who Code, supporting women and emerging leaders in technology through regional founder, workforce, and AI communities.
Based in Wichita. Works nationally.
A thirty-year talent development system,
operating in plain sight.
Before MindScapes was a consulting firm, before it was an Innovation Campus role, before it was a Fortune 50 career — it was a teacher in front of a room of students, building the future operators of an industry that didn't fully exist yet.
"I started at Wichita State in 1999, helping with a Department of Education grant to prepare teachers to use technology in the classroom. I was trying to flip how technology was being used — to be more "I'm using it to create something" instead of "I'm learning how to type.""
That mission — teach people to create with technology, not just consume it — has shaped thirty years of work. Tonya has taught at WSU, ESSDACK, and dozens of other institutions, helping educators, founders, and operators learn to wield emerging technology rather than be displaced by it.
In the 2000s, she founded the Shocker MINDSTORMS Competition at WSU — a robotics tournament for middle school students that gave Kansas kids their first hands-on experience with engineering, programming, and team-based building. Two of those middle schoolers grew up to become MindScapes operating partners.
Nic Wentling
Competed in the Shocker MINDSTORMS Competition as a middle schooler. Studied with Tonya at WSU. Now leads Moonbase Labs — a Wichita-based custom software firm that builds bespoke digital solutions for organizations on a mission. A MindScapes operating partner on Build & Launch engagements requiring custom software development.
Ramsey Jamoul
Also competed in the Shocker MINDSTORMS Competition as a middle schooler. Also studied with Tonya at WSU. Now leads the AI Prompt Championship — a national competition advancing AI literacy — and UEA. Tonya serves on the AI Prompt Championship board. MindScapes partners with both ventures on AI workforce and competition programming.
The two stories aren't anecdotes. They are evidence of a system.
For thirty years, Tonya has been quietly seeding the talent ecosystem of Kansas tech — first as a teacher, then as a program builder, then as a connector. The students she taught a decade ago are the operators MindScapes works with today. The middle schoolers who competed in MINDSTORMS are the founders running their own AI ventures now. The teachers she trained in 1999 are the leaders in education today shaping how the next generation learns to build.
This is what "Connection compounds" looks like over thirty years. MindScapes' purpose-built teams aren't recruited from a network. They were grown — through classrooms, competitions, mentorships, and the kind of long relationships that only show their value decades later.
Sustained service across sectors.
Economic empowerment, arts and culture, health, science and technology, education — long-tenured engagement across multiple sectors.
- National AI Prompt Championship · Judge & Board Member (2025–present)
- NXTUS · Board of Directors (2023–present)
- Botanica · Board of Trustees, Chair, Technology Committee (2022–present)
- Wichita Women in Tech (WIT) · Member & Speaker (ongoing)
- Women Who Code · Mentor (2012–2024)
- University Economic Development Association (UEDA) · Executive Board Member (2023–2025)
- APLU Commission on Economic & Community Engagement (CECE) · Executive Committee (2023–2025)
- Public Policy and Management Center, WSU · Board of Champions (2023–2025)
- Kansas Health Science Center · Tech Advisory Council (2020–2025)
- FlagshipKansas.Tech · Founding Member (2019–2025)
- Cosmosphere · Governing Board (2019–2021)
- The Independent School, Wichita · Board of Trustees, Chair, International Diploma Program (2016–2022)
- 1 Million Cups Wichita · Co-Founder (2015–2017)
- BREG: Blueprint for Regional Economic Growth · Data Services & IT Cluster Leader (2015–2017)
- UEDA ARENI Advisory Council (2022–2023)
A working footprint in founder country.
Beyond formal board service, Tonya is actively embedded in the Wichita and regional startup ecosystem — mentoring founders, evaluating grants, leading communities of practice, and helping small businesses navigate AI, technology, and compliance.
Groover Labs · Accel-KS
Grant Evaluation Committee member for the Kansas Department of Commerce's Accel-KS proof-of-concept grants. Interviewed 60+ applicants, helped determine funding decisions, and provides ongoing product-market fit and technology support to every funded winner. Innovation Kansas →
NXTUS Alumni Collective
Board member and active mentor through the NXTUS Alumni Collective — leading roundtable sessions on tech stack design, AI strategy, and operational systems for early-stage founders across multiple cohorts.
1 Million Cups Wichita
Co-founded the Wichita chapter of 1 Million Cups in 2015. Continues to attend, mentor, and connect founders to the broader regional ecosystem. 1 Million Cups Wichita →
Groover Labs Campfire
Mentor and leader for the Campfire entrepreneurship series — a peer-learning community for early-stage founders. Campfire →
WIBA · Wichita Independent Business Association
Frequent speaker at WIBA events, including the Women Level Up Seminar series — helping women founders and small business owners navigate technology decisions and AI adoption.
Wichita AI Club
Founding leader of the Wichita AI Club — a regional community of practice for AI practitioners, business leaders, and curious operators learning to use AI well.
KC Tech Council
Active member of the Kansas City Tech Council, connecting Wichita's tech ecosystem with the broader regional infrastructure, workforce, and AI conversations across Kansas and Missouri.
CMMC Midwest Conference
Five years involved with the CMMC Midwest Conference — speaking, organizing, and helping small and medium-sized businesses in the DoD supply chain navigate cybersecurity compliance. CMMC Midwest →
Founders Table ICT
Regular attendee at Founders Table — Wichita's informal founder gathering. The kind of room where the real introductions happen and where Tonya often connects MindScapes engagements with the right operators.
Honored by peers across technology, research, and economic development.
Ready for a conversation?
Whether you're scoping a project or just want to compare notes on what's coming next — let's talk.
Request a Brief