Alumni On The Move: Amy Dukes
Amy Dukes wanted to get a master’s degree that best helped her serve others. We sat down with her to learn more about her time at WVU and how it’s shaped her career.
Q: How did your WVU Master’s Degree shape your current career path?
A: I have worked in senior services and nonprofits my entire career and I've had a number of different roles throughout. I had the opportunity to work in marketing. I received a promotion and I thought: I need to be better in order to give this job everything that it deserves. I started looking into master's programs and finding this program specifically has been wonderful because of the integrated marketing nature of it. It's helped me to learn every aspect of marketing and communication and that's really helped me to shape what I'm doing with my job so that what I learn brings immediate value to my company.
Q: Did your master's degree allow you to advance in your current role or create opportunities for another job?
A: Absolutely. I was promoted into a new position and I wanted to really prove that I could excel in this role. In the IMC master’s program, I felt that each class allowed me to really focus on what I'm doing in my current role. This helped me to bring value to my organization immediately. With what I learned in every class, I was able to bring something new to my job and this helped to expand what we're doing within my organization.
Q: What made West Virginia University stand out from other universities when you were choosing a master's program? And are you originally from West Virginia or do you work in a different state?
A: I'm in Pittsburgh. I'm from Pittsburgh. I've worked for nonprofits my entire career, and I finally found myself working for an organization that offers tuition reimbursement to support me in furthering my education. Never before have I had that opportunity. I thought, “you’ve been complaining for 20 years that you haven’t had this opportunity, you have to do it!”
I began to look for master’s degree programs and I started an MBA program at another university. I thought that learning more about the business world would be really helpful to enhance my skills in a leadership role in non profits. I felt that what I was learning in the MBA program was very general. We were studying Tesla and BP, which are really great companies to study, but I work in very local nonprofits. So, what I was learning there wasn't something that I could bring to my job and really utilize right away. I was unsatisfied with that and I started doing research into what different universities had to offer.
What really caught my eye about the Integrated Marketing Communications program is that there were built in ways to specialize. When I spoke to the Admissions staff for the program to really learn about what IMC offers, what stood out to me is in each class you can really focus on the business type that you're interested in. Whether it's your own business or something similar, the flexibility allows you to really take what you're learning in class and use it in the workforce right away.
Q: Was there any content in your coursework that challenged or changed your thinking? If so, what specifically?
A: All of it. I am old now, so learning more about digital marketing was huge for me. Diving into social media content creation and general digital marketing strategy and how to target different audiences was eye opening.
In my undergrad I studied psychology and sociology, so I understood the idea of research, but marketing research is very different. The ability to do marketing research is so important, but you're not going to get a huge sample size for your research like you would in psychology and sociology. All of the classes about market research were extremely helpful so that I can actually utilize what I learned and conduct research in a reasonable way.
Q: Were you caring for a family or balancing other responsibilities while completing the program?
A: Yes. I am a single mom. I have two kids and my eldest was a senior in high school. My goal was to graduate before my eldest started college.
I have two kids. I have a bunch of pets. I have family that I coordinate some things for and I'm working full-time in a fairly high-level position. So, it was a lot to pursue a master's degree on top of that, and I'm very proud that I was able to complete the program.
In my undergrad I graduated with a GPA of 3.96, even though I know it makes me a nerd. Going into my master's classes, I told myself not to focus on my GPA and add unnecessary stress to myself. You have to have a certain grade in order to get tuition reimbursement, but don't kill yourself to get a high-grade point average. But I just couldn't. Right? So, I ended up graduating with a 4.0. I was super proud of that.
It was a lot. And did something slip? Yes. Was my house as clean as it should have been? No. Were my kids quite as over mothered as they should have been? No, but we got through it.
Q: Was there a favorite spot in your home where you were doing schoolwork? Was there a desk, couch, coffee shop, or other location where you felt like you were your most productive?
A: I have a back porch that's covered. Anytime the weather permitted, I would do work on the back porch because the kids knew where I was, but they knew if they came outside and said they were bored, I would make them do yard work. So I could get work done on the back porch and the kids would only seek me out when they actually needed me. That’s my “mom hack.”
Q: Were there any specific courses, instructors or projects that stood out to you through the course of your master's program?
A: I had some really great instructors. It was really nice that the instructors have worked in the industry, so they have seen it all and had really good suggestions to improve students’ work. They had an understanding that yes, we're asking you to do this for school, but we understand that in the industry it's going be a little bit different. They helped us to understand how we can apply the classwork to our real jobs.
I can't really highlight any one instructor because they were all really great. There was probably something that I got special from each instructor because of their varied backgrounds. The discussions were absolutely amazing because you can have a discussion with your instructor, but also with your peers. It wasn't quite like being in a classroom, but the content and the focus of the discussion stayed on point because it was written and there were certain parameters around it. So there wasn't a lot of getting off topic or losing focus.
Q: What would you say to someone trying to decide between this program and another marketing program?
A: I would tell anyone who's looking for a program to really push and find out how specific and specialized you can get with your own interests. That’s one thing I like about this program, even though I didn't follow one of the specialization paths that you can. If you're really interested in digital content, for example, you're still going to get a good, holistic, integrated marketing communication degree and education, but you're also going to be able to focus on how to enhance digital content.
The classes will never feel too general or like something that doesn't apply to what you're doing. With this program the key was that in each class I could focus my attention on my industry within that topic. All of the papers I wrote, all of the discussions could focus on the industry that I'm working in. The course content and coursework fit with what I'm doing professionally and that was key for me to make it feel like it wasn't a waste of time.
Q: What does being a WVU alum mean to you?
A: I am really proud of it. I went to a very small local college for undergrad, and people in my area kind of know it so I can say: “this is where I went,” and they're like, “oh yeah, I (vaguely) know of it.”
But with WVU-everyone knows WVU. It's the same level of accomplishment, but it's much more recognized. I can walk down the hall and see someone with a WVU T-shirt on and say, “oh, that's where I just graduated from!” Having that connection with more alumni makes it a little bit more fun.
The other thing is there's much more content available at WVU than at a smaller university. If you really want to learn about a certain subject, that expertise exists in the WVU staff, so that you can pull in those other specialties and that knowledge, which you don't always get at a smaller university.