As soon as Thaylene Lowe Rogers made her decision to return to school for an Executive MBA, she hit the GMAT prep books. During a trip to Newport Beach, California, vacation time turned into study time as she and her son began plowing through the math section. After a year of brushing up, she was in. By 2015 she’ll be sporting a new Marriott School degree on her office wall.
This isn’t her first go-around, though. Thirty-three years ago Rogers received her bachelor’s degree in accounting from BYU. She is a lifelong learner, and going back to school has been a great fit for her, despite the sacrifices required in what she calls “a two-dimensional life”: her evenings are dedicated to the classroom after a day’s work as the business manager and accountant for two BYU fine arts departments.
The 1981 accounting grad entered the accounting program at a time when women were sparse in the field. After being recruited for the program, she changed her course from English and law school to numbers. Just as it did with the EMBA program, she feels one door kept leading to another. “It all fell into place,” she says. “I couldn’t even really tell you why or how.”
After receiving her bachelor’s degree, Rogers did tax work for Arthur Andersen and a CPA firm and later worked for NuSkin before beginning her employment with BYU. In her current position Rogers enjoys seeing art, theater, and film projects go from a list of purchases to the finished product.
“We have such complementary skills,” she says of her association with the arts. “The people I work with are so grateful to hand over the stuff they don’t care to deal with, and I totally appreciate what they do because it’s not something in my skill set. We really have a mutual appreciation of one another.”
As far as her career after graduation, Rogers is very happy where she is. “My only objective is to have more to offer,” she says. She and her husband, Mark, will be happy, however, to return more fully to their favorite hobby—traveling. Since she started the EMBA program, their usual itineraries have been reduced to short weekend trips, often involving visits to their four children and three grandchildren. Even with her busy schedule, Rogers makes time for her daily therapy session: an eight-mile run. She and Mark live in Lindon, Utah.
