At 35, Lauren Lewis began asking herself questions familiar to many veterans and service members.
“I’m halfway through my career in the military, and this is all I have,” says Lewis. “How do you translate that into civilian language?"
Lewis decided she needed a credential to back up her experience. And having grown up only a half-hour away from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, she enrolled to finish her bachelor’s degree and start her career as a civilian.
The Bachelor of General Studies online degree program gave her the tools to do that as well as tools to connect with and support fellow veterans and service members in new ways.
Hard lessons – In and Out of the Classroom
It wasn’t that attending college had never occurred to Lewis. She’d enrolled in an out-of-state university as a young soldier and soon found out that while her military benefits covered most of her tuition, she was on the hook for thousands in fees.
She re-enlisted in the National Guard, asking for loan repayment, and for 14 years was in a full-time role with the National Guard.
Eventually, it was time to finish what she’d started.
“I earned the benefits, so why not use them?” says Lewis. “I can't even begin to tell you how many degree plans I had.”
When Lewis enrolled at UL Lafayette, she did so as an engineering major, which meant she was basically starting from scratch even though she’d earned college credit previously.
It didn’t take long for one of her advisors to step in with an alternative to save Lewis time and money.
“He was like, ‘honestly, you're not a spring chicken anymore, and you have way too much knowledge. If I were you, I would change my major to General Studies, and if you want to be an engineer then come back for the two-year graduate program,’” she says. “And I listened.”
Lewis connected with University College advisor Sharon Gregory and quickly had the degree plan that would be the path to her bachelor’s and would open her eyes to a world of opportunity.
“It just opened like 25 cans of worms because you're learning marketing, you're learning about law, you're learning about criminal justice, you're learning about mental health, you learn about diversity,” she says. “So, all things are beginning to make sense and you realize how much everything is connected. It's really cool because you get to dive in and then kind of figure out what works best for you.”
Determination to Finish the Degree
Earning her degree online at UL Lafayette meant a few things for Lewis. She was able to:
- use her GI Bill for the bulk of her tuition;
- maintain a full-time job with Habitat for Humanity; and
- juggle monthly training and multiple disaster relief deployments with the National Guard.
To balance her military duties, Lewis found support across the University, from the Office of Veteran & Military Student Services to online faculty.
At one point, her active duty put her two weeks behind, but Lewis was able to work with her instructor to stay on track.
"She gave me the opportunity, and I did two weeks of work in one week, and then I caught up with the rest of the class,” says Lewis. “She made that possible. I mean, it was awesome.”
Plus, she had a built-in accountability partner.
“My niece is a year younger than me and also attending UL Lafayette, and she's in the nursing program,” says Lewis. “We studied together, and we cooked together, and we made it work together.”
Lewis also relied on her own self-discipline to manage her coursework alongside her myriad responsibilities.
“I was really strict about it,” she says. "When I got off of work, I would sit down and do my homework until like two o'clock in the morning, or I would take a nap when I got home from work and then I would stay up all night long and do my homework.”
Course Smorgasbord
Lewis' stamina was driven by her determination to finish her degree coupled with a hunger to explore new concepts.
“I definitely gave my advisor a hard time because I would take a course and then say, ‘maybe I want to go into criminal justice,’ or, ‘well, now I want to go to law school,’” says Lewis. “I couldn’t make up my mind about anything.”
Economics? Horticulture? Architecture? Lewis’ advisor navigated her insatiable appetite for learning with applicable course recommendations while ensuring she completed the core requirements to complete her degree.
Among Lewis’ electives were courses in Health Equity, Women's Health, Health and Sexuality, and Multicultural Health. Through those courses, she gained insights into transgender issues.
She’d had first-hand experience working with fellow soldiers going through the transitioning process without the knowledge she later gained through her curriculum. Lewis was able to take that knowledge back to her superiors to better support transitioning service members.
“I had no idea about it. The course helped me tremendously,” she says. “After that, I gave briefings about it and taught my higher ups how to handle those situations with compassion, more understanding and less judgement. It was pretty incredible.”
The [not quite] Finish Line
During commencement ceremonies in Spring 2023, Lauren Lewis earned her Bachelor of General Studies and received recognition as a student and servicemember.
Lewis is processing how far she’s come and considering her next steps. She says she might pursue grad school or even a second bachelor’s degree.
Meanwhile she’s continuing to work and make an impact with Habitat for Humanity — a job, she says, she found through one of her online courses.
“I'm helping people on my block. We're on our 10th house right now, since I started last July,” she says. “It's incredible. And we're also working on a repair program, which I would like to be a part of.”