Degree(s): BJ '73

Whereabouts: United States, Skyland, North Carolina

What do you do?
I am the vice-president of EGA Inc., a consulting firm in Skyland, North Carolina. In that capacity, I have handled all marketing, sales and financials since 2004.

How did you get your job?
I had been working in the produce industry for two major international publications, serving that industry from 1977-2003. I then moved on to handling sales and marketing for a Michigan produce company and began helping EGA on a part-time basis at that time. I went full time with EGA in 2005.

What is the best professional lesson you learned at the J-School?
I was in charge of sales for the Sunday magazine supplement for the Columbia Missourian in my senior year. I learned to treat all customers – large or small – with the same respect and courtesy they deserved. This was a lesson that paid off very nicely when I sold advertising for trade publications.

What advice do you have for current students?
Embrace the new journalism avenues, but please, check your sources. The internet can be one big rumor mill.

What is your favorite J-School memory?
Sitting in my professor’s office on a cold December day and him allowing me to use his phone to call my parents in Miami to let them know I had graduated.

Any additional comments?
M – I – Z!