Editor’s Note: This is the second in a series of profiles of graduates who attended the 2024 Winter Grad Walk.
Kristin James and Michelle Daye met on the job at University of Maryland, Baltimore, where both were working with the university’s donor program. It didn’t take long for them to become close friends, supporting one another through the birth of a baby, the COVID pandemic, a wedding and family loss.
They also became each other’s champion in a shared quest to complete their college degrees. Taking advantage of free college tuition through their employer, they enrolled together at Ƶ (UMGC). Although they pursued different degrees—and never even took a course together—they untiringly encouraged one another through class assignments, projects and long nights of study, all the while navigating full-time jobs and families.
“Michelle is an amazing coworker who became my work bestie. We immediately connected,” James said. “I was a couple of years older than her so we talked about life. Every now and then we talked about school, and how our jobs paid for tuition.
“We decided to go for it.”
James and Daye were among more than 2,500 graduates attending UMGC’s Winter Grad Walk 2024. James earned a Bachelor of Arts in Communication while Daye earned a Bachelor of Business Administration.
James and Daye enrolled at UMGC together in 2019, and while they studied for their degrees, the women went through a number of ups and downs. James married and became the parent of a teenaged boy. Daye managed a pregnancy. Both women struggled through the COVID pandemic, and James was pulled into a vortex of loss when an aunt and a cousin died as a result of the virus.
“I had to take some time off to deal with grief during the pandemic,” she said. Daye gently nudged her back onto her academic path.
Then it was James’s turn. She stepped forward with encouragement when, in the final stretch of her degree program, Daye gave birth to a son, now 2.
“I had my son on the third, and I had a paper due on the sixth. I have pictures of myself with the baby on my chest as I work on the paper,” Daye said. “I had to get it done—and I still can’t believe it myself that I did.”
Daye recalled that James constantly reassured her that they would complete their degrees. “I said, ‘What if I fail?’ She said, ‘You’re not going to fail,’” Daye said.
Years earlier, James had studied at Morgan State University but did not complete a degree. For Daye, UMGC represented a first-time college experience. Both women already had a lot on their plates. In addition to her job, Daye had children aged 5 and 7 when she embarked on her degree program. Besides her university job, James worked as a pastor at GraceCity Church in Baltimore, gave motivational speeches and presentations and managed a theater production company.
“We had to plan our time well,” Daye said. “There were a lot of late nights and early mornings with classwork. I studied on my lunch break every day and spent weekends writing papers.
“A lot of time we were reminding each other that we were going to get through this,” she added.
When James was having difficulty with a math class, Daye, who was enrolled in a statistics class at the time, reminded her friend that UMGC provides plenty of online resources, including tutoring. James said UMGC’s professors also understood the challenges of adult learners. She was especially pleased with a communications class where the teacher required weekly conferences with each student.
“I wish other instructors did the same thing,” she said. “She made it mandatory, she made the time available and she was mindful about these interactions. It kept me on track.”
James wanted a communications degree to enhance her work as a pastor and generally build her skillset. She has recently moved into a new job as an academic coordinator at University of Maryland, Baltimore.
“I was able to stretch my resume and enhance skillsets that made me stand out in work and the community,” she said.
For her part, Daye has seen a work promotion thanks to the accounting courses she took in her business degree program. “I went from accounting clerk to accounting associate,” she said.
The job moves mean the friends now work in different departments a block apart. But that doesn’t keep them from meeting regularly for lunch. Even more, they’re gearing up to support each other through another set of UMGC degrees. Daye has already enrolled in the MBA program and starts classes on Jan. 8. James plans to pursue a master’s degree in strategic communications.
First, however, they are celebrating their undergraduate degrees. For James, that celebration has special significance. Adopted at just 2 weeks old, she has been reunited—after 37 years—with her biological parents. Her birth mother will be among those attending Grad Walk.
“This is the first major accomplishment in my life that she is able to be part of,” James explained. She’ll join James’s husband, son, parents, grandmother and brother to see the conferral of James’s degree.
James said she hopes her graduation inspires the younger generations in her family—including nieces who look up to her—as well as others who are considering going back to school.
“I felt a little defeated because I was around people who graduated straight from high school, and I did four years at Morgan State but didn’t finish my degree. I felt that there was no point in going back, that I was too old, that the degree would take too long,” James said. “But then I became determined to go back. Completing it is so rewarding.”
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