Kaitlin Banks just participated in the celebrations of April 2019 graduates, as she completed her degree with the Bachelor of General Studies program. She left BYU to support her husband in his career but was eventually able to come back to work on her degree. With a Management Emphasis, she took classes that helped her to practice and improve her communication skills, writing ability, quantitive analysis skills, marketing understanding, and other business-related skills that she has been able to use in unexpected ways, such as in participation in her children’s school’s PTO (Parent Teacher Ohana, as they call the PTA in Hawaii).
Kaitlin is a mother to three children, a supportive wife, a part-time employee, and a contributing member of her church and neighborhood communities. Of her experience with the BGS Program, she says,
“It allowed me to maintain my identity while growing my family over the last 13 years. It was the one thing that I focused on for myself that I could hold onto while putting everybody else first. It’s the one goal I had in mind that I was determined to meet. I worked part time, and I found that this degree was applicable to my employment. Not only was it degree helpful but I found that I retained more information studying under this kind of pressure than I ever did when I was at Brigham Young University. There is something to be said when you only have four hours to complete an assignment, being under that kind of pressure narrows your focus, and with that narrowed focus I retained more information. Although this was the harder way to complete a degree, I’m really glad that I did it this way, I feel like it will stay with me longer.”
