Yanez Anderson

If all goes according to plan, next spring Yanez Anderson will graduate from Russell Sage College with her B.A. in Psychology, one step closer to a career as a therapist who specializes in helping young women.

There seems nothing particularly unusual about that, except when you consider that in order to have graduation day be perfect, Yanez will have to get time off from her full-time job working for the state of New York, her husband will need to be away from the business he owns, and her two daughters — in high school and college — will have to clear their busy schedules.

So, as you can see now, the college experience for Yanez hasn’t been ordinary at all. 

Years ago, she started out thinking she’d become a nurse but with young children and a job she just couldn’t make it work. It was too overwhelming. She needed to back off and put her career dreams on hold, while she continued to work and help her daughters be successful in school and play all kind of sports. 

As time passed, Yanez modified her dreams. She considered that becoming a counselor or therapist would still allow her to help people, without turning her life completely upside down. And Sage offered an evening bachelor’s program in Psychology, the only evening program of its kind in the Capital Region.

The program also included teachers who were more than ready to help Yanez overcome her challenges. “They were all really helpful,” Yanez says. “I could reach out to them at any time. They’re available. The thing is, they really want you to succeed.” 

Yanez finds that many people believe a Psychology degree doesn’t open up many career possibilities. She strongly disagrees. “One of the things I’ve learned at Sage is that there will be many jobs available to me in my field, and my professors are ready to open doors.”

She’s thinking she’d like to focus on helping young women, because she had some important older women in her life that were able to share wise counsel, including her mother and grandmother.

Having daughters of her own, Yanez says, is even more motivation to become more of a leader and spokesperson for young women.

For others like her who have a dream that seems hard to realize, for those who wonder if they can go back to school and have a job and raise a family, Yanez says simply, “Just do it.” Because she’s very glad she did. And glad Sage was there to make it possible.