the.com/role model

means A person held up as an example whose behavior or success others are encouraged to imitate.

from A 20th-century coinage from sociology — the sociologist Robert K. Merton is credited with popularizing 'role model' around the mid-1900s, building on his work on 'role theory,' which borrowed the theatrical idea of a 'role' (a part played, from French 'rôle,' originally the roll of paper an actor's lines were written on) and applied it to the social parts people perform — parent, doctor, leader. A 'role model' was simply someone whose performance of a role others patterned themselves after. The word's theater roots are why we still say people 'play' a role, long before they ever model one.