Mid-career professionals discover new opportunities with continuing studies
How professional master’s degrees or certificates from Georgetown University take careers to the next level.
By WP Creative Group
February 20, 2024
Ethan Faxon says he never imagined he would be accepted to a school like Georgetown University.
“I was never a great student growing up,” he says. “Even in high school, I just didn’t really gravitate towards learning like others did. After high school, I went straight to the military.”
After serving five years in the Army, Faxon decided he would go back to school with renewed vigor and focus. He earned a bachelor’s degree in homeland security from the University of New Hampshire at Manchester, where he says his professors encouraged him to take the next step and pursue a master’s degree.
For Faxon, that next step was the Master’s in Emergency & Disaster Management program at Georgetown University’s School of Continuing Studies (Georgetown SCS).
Georgetown SCS offers more than 30 professional certificate programs and 15 professional master’s programs. Whether taken online or in person, each program provides students with industry-specific skills that are applicable in the real world.
“The ultimate decider for me was that Georgetown’s program had a capstone requirement and other schools did not,” he says. “I liked that the program provided an extra level of detail, where everything you’ve learned is compiled into one final project. I felt confident that Georgetown would make me a subject matter expert.”
The day Faxon received his acceptance letter to Georgetown, he knew he was on the right track. He graduated from UNH Manchester on a Saturday in May 2021 and the next Monday started at Georgetown.
New opportunities for the nation’s service members
Georgetown University has a long tradition of supporting our nation’s service members, including participating in the Yellow Ribbon Program, which waives tuition costs for veterans. Georgetown SCS recently enhanced this financial access by offering unlimited Yellow Ribbon Scholarships.
“As veterans, we can often sell ourselves short,” Faxon says. “A lot of us went in without a bachelor’s degree so we don’t have that formal education, and we have gaps in experience that make it harder once we transition into the civilian world. Georgetown recognized this, and elevates veterans by showing we can still contribute to the School and to the workforce.”
Faxon continues to reach new academic and professional heights. After completing his capstone on hazardous waste and debris removal, and graduating from Georgetown SCS in 2023, he was selected as a finalist for the Presidential Management Fellows program.
This fellowship program, run by the federal government, matches outstanding graduate students with federal opportunities. Faxon was appointed with the EPA Federal Facilities Restoration and Reuse Office.
“In a small office of just 16, I have to wear a lot of hats,” Faxon says. “But each role I play has been solidified by what I’ve learned in the classroom at Georgetown. The transition was seamless.”
Designed with professional learners in mind
When Nneka Nix looks back at her long career in public health, she can pinpoint the moment she was introduced to strategic management – though she didn’t recognize it at the time.
In 2013, after earning her master’s in public health, Nix was hired as a program assistant for the Institute for Public Health Innovation. Her role quickly grew, and soon she was tasked with overseeing the program evaluation strategy for D.C.’s health insurance marketplace consumer assistance program.
“It was certainly a baptism by fire, but I didn’t think of it as strategic management at the time,” Nix recalls. “Back then I only focused on the ‘evaluation’ part of the strategic management continuum, if programs were delivering what they planned to deliver, and if they’re not meeting their goals, I helped them course correct.”
Throughout her career, Nix says her roles continued to intersect with strategy. In her current position at U.S. Pharmacopeia, an organization that addresses quality assurance of medicines, dietary supplements and foods, Nix is one of the leads responsible for the organization’s 2025–2030 strategic planning process.
“I kept having these touchpoints with strategy and I was doing okay with figuring it out, but I’ve never had formal training,” Nix says. “I don’t want to just do this work based on what feels right, so I decided I needed some best practices under my belt.”
In February 2023, Nix enrolled in an intensive, one-week Certificate in Strategic Management program at Georgetown SCS where she says she found the academic rigor, class flexibility and professional expertise she was looking for.
Jeffrey Warner, senior director of professional development and certificates at Georgetown SCS, says that 62 percent of certificate-earners, like Nix, already have a graduate degree.
“What we’re finding is that our learners are typically in their mid-to-late 30s,” says Warner. “These are mid-career individuals coming to us and saying, ‘The world has changed so quickly since I was an undergrad or left my master’s program. I need to really advance my skills either to move up in my current organization, or maybe even jump into a brand new profession.’”
For these professional learners, who are often working full-time jobs while going back to school, time is crucial. All of the professional master’s programs at Georgetown SCS can be completed within two years, while some of the university’s professional certificates can be earned in as little as three days.
Programs can also be taken online or in person, which Warner says encourages students to do what’s best for their learning style.
“We don’t all learn the same way, so Georgetown offers flexibility, understanding the diversity and uniqueness of our learners,” he says. “We recently redesigned all of our certificates to overcome the barriers of time, access, and cost. Our focus is always on the benefit to the professional learner.
“For instance,” Warner continues, “our strategic management certificate was a 10-week course in the classroom prior to 2020, but we moved it online while also continuing to offer it in the classroom at 640 Massachusetts Avenue. Now we are basically filling all the seats in both modalities for strategic management.”
Nix completed the strategic management certificate program online, and says the experience was “seamless.” “Looking at a monitor all day, it can be hard to maintain your attention,” Nix admits. “But they had good breakout groups and they switched it up often with different activities to keep you engaged.”
Regardless of whether a student takes a class online or in person, Warner says the values of Georgetown University are built directly into the syllabus.
“We’re very intentional in designing our educational experience with the Jesuit values in mind,” Warner says. “For every course that’s developed or even just refreshed, we incorporate the concept of respect and care for the whole person. Every student learns how to take what they’ve learned back to their communities and jobs to make the world a better place.”
Not only did completing the certificate program at Georgetown SCS allow Nix to feel more confident in performing the duties of her current role, but a year later, she was promoted to director.
“I have absolutely used the templates for strategic management provided during my course at Georgetown back at USP,” says Nix. “I left Georgetown excited about taking what I’d learned back to my own organization and I’ve recommended this course to quite a number of people!”
No matter the area of expertise, Warner says he’s a fan of lifelong learning and encourages anyone thinking about going back to school to consider a professional degree or certificate from Georgetown SCS.
“Each New Year, people start making resolutions about how to better their lives,” he says. “I would encourage every professional out there to think about how an educational experience with distinguished faculty members and peers at your level could enhance your career, enhance your understanding of life, or just bring richness to your profession as well as your personal life.”
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