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In the process of tie-dying a shirt, all the colors start out separately but eventually blend together, forming interesting patterns and connections. In a similar way, Mikayla Cheng hopes to encourage genuine relationships among students at BYU through her social media app, Tiedye. Although building the app has been challenging, Cheng has received help from several resources, including the Rollins Center of Entrepreneurship and Technology at the BYU Marriott School of Business.

Not long after Kim Scoville began teaching at the BYU Marriott School of Business, she noticed a need for legal knowledge in the school’s entrepreneurship program. As a graduate of BYU’s J. Rueben Clark Law School, Scoville has spent her career providing legal advice to startup companies. Her work experience prompted her to create an entrepreneurship class that focused on legal issues for BYU Marriott’s entrepreneurship students, many of whom own or plan to own businesses.

While attending a freshman career exploration class, Brooke Taylor was searching for a major in a friendly community that would also develop her personal skills. The current BYU Marriott School of Business senior discovered the experience design and management program through that class and now strives to create and support communities as she uplifts herself and others.

Nearly sixty-five percent of BYU students speak a second language, and BYU ranks third in the nation for the most graduates with foreign language degrees. For bilingual students who want to couple their language skills with business knowledge, the global business and literacy minor offered by the Whitmore Global Business Center (GBC) at the BYU Marriott School of Business can help students accomplish that goal.

The journey to becoming the first-ever chief operating officer and chief safety officer for the Natural History Museum of Utah was not one that Abby Curran expected. Curran says she owes her success to the MBA program at the BYU Marriott School of Business and her life experiences that taught her to never stop improving.

Although Emily Gertsch's career path eventually led her to the medical field, the BYU Marriott alum still applies her accounting skills from the School of Accountancy (SOA) to her current position as a medical director for F. Hoffmann-La Roche AG.

While entrepreneurship has been a lifelong goal for Nathan Miller, he did not fully commit to his dreams until listening to a guest speaker in one of his classes at the BYU Marriott School of Business. The speaker motivated Miller, who is now a senior, to overcome self-doubt and start a business that combines his education with his passion for the outdoors, resulting in winter apparel with a unique mission.

When she was eleven years old, Autumn Clark read an article about modern-day slavery and felt something spark within her. From that moment on, she became passionate about social innovation and making a difference in the lives of others. This interest eventually led her to the information systems (IS) program at the BYU Marriott School of Business, where she now strives to solve problems using her technological expertise.

Many college students leave behind the comforts of home when they head off to school. When Alexis Rankin arrived at BYU as a transfer student, she chose to give up the comforts of the career she grew up thinking she would pursue. Despite this big change, Rankin was able to attend student association meetings at the BYU Marriott School of Business, which helped her find a new career path as a human resource management student.

Whether he’s teaching students in a classroom or coaching his players from the sidelines of a volleyball court, BYU Marriott School of Business accounting alum RJ Mattei loves learning and teaching in many forms.

The more Breann Hunt learns about social impact causes, the more she envisions businesses changing the way they operate forever. The BYU Marriott School of Business strategy senior hopes to change the industry as a social impact consultant who helps businesses take on bigger roles in making a difference in their communities. Hunt is studying strategic management at BYU Marriott because she believes the program will give her the tools to help companies make those changes.

Inspired by his father, Carlos Valles moved from Mexico to the United States to study at the BYU Marriott School of Business and launch his career. Now working as a brand manager for The Hershey Company, the marketing alum is fueled by his passion for business and influential experiences at BYU Marriott. 

In 1984, a young Colby Wright watched the BYU football team win the national championship after beating the University of Michigan in the Holiday Bowl. Watching the team’s improbable run to the top proved to be an inspiring catalyst in Wright’s life as he later attended BYU. Years later, Wright is now back at BYU as a professor of finance at the BYU Marriott School of Business, though not because of his love for the football team, but because of the exceptional students he works with on a regular basis. He is also grateful for the character principles BYU Marriott is built on, which he strives to live by running a nonprofit for higher education in the Philippines.

As an undergraduate student at BYU, Christine Parks initially joined the accounting program simply because she enjoyed the subject of accounting. Now as a MAcc student at the School of Accountancy (SOA) at BYU Marriott School of Business, Parks loves the accounting program for additional reasons, namely, the unique opportunities that the program gives her to interact with other people.

As an adjunct professor at the BYU Marriott School of Business, Beth Wilkins knows her students want to make a difference in the world. Wilkins teaches a leadership class in the human resource management program that helps students learn how to make that difference by first understanding themselves better. To this end, Wilkins strives to bring her knowledge and experience as an industry professional, including running her own consulting firm, to the classroom.

While growing up on a farm in Leeton, Missouri, Amy Caldwell woke up each morning and bounded off to play with the horses, milk the cows, and retrieve eggs from the chickens. Her upbringing taught her the value of hard work. Now as a mentor for the Rollins Center of Entrepreneurship and Technology at the BYU Marriott School of Business, Caldwell focuses on establishing connections with student entrepreneurs and teaching them the value hard work.

When she was a freshman at BYU, Ashley Weiler's first meeting with the Women of the School of Accountancy (WSOA) club left her in awe. Through the WSOA, Weiler finally found the missing piece of her BYU education: a place where she belonged. Now as the president of the WSOA, Weiler hopes to show incoming female students that they can also feel at home in the accounting program.

After drinking a soda on his way home from campus, BYU Marriott School of Business alum Ryan Smith was surprised to find his student apartment did not have any way to recycle his empty can. After reading a BYU survey that showed the majority of students also wanted to recycle, the 2016 strategy alum started thinking of the idea for Recyclops, a gig economy recycling company. Running his own business while taking classes allowed Smith to learn much more from the strategy program. Although Recyclops almost failed, applying the principles he learned in the classroom to his work helped Smith produce a multimillion-dollar company.

A group of BYU Army ROTC students finished tenth out of forty-four teams in the April 2021 Sandhurst Challenge at West Point, New York. Competing against leading ROTC programs from around the country, BYU Army ROTC cadets pushed past their limits and used their military skills to complete an extreme competition, testing both their physical and mental capacities.

BYU Marriott School of Business alum Wes Whitman owns his own real estate private equity firm and has an MBA from Harvard, achievements the 2003 finance graduate credits to the foundational experiences he had at BYU Marriott. His education as an undergraduate prepared him for accomplishments throughout his life and allows him to now give back to the school that helped set his career in motion. After succeeding in real estate, he now works to helps students strengthen their knowledge of real estate career paths and create connections with the BYU Marriott alumni network.