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After 20-year study break, Indian mom to earn Master’s from Arizona Univ
Forty-six-year-old Neha Gupta returned to the classroom following a marital separation and financial difficulties.
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Pranavi Sharma - Wed, 14, May 2025
- 02:25 EDT
- 136
Neha Gupta. / University of Arizona
After a 20-year break from formal education, 46-year-old Neha Gupta, originally from India, is graduating this week with a Master’s degree in business analytics from the University of Arizona. A single mother of two daughters, Gupta returned to the classroom following a marital separation and financial difficulties—an achievement she once thought out of reach.
Gupta is among approximately 9,000 students who will be conferred degrees during the University of Arizona’s 161st Commencement on May 16.
When her older daughter was admitted to the University of California San Diego, Gupta began thinking about her own future. “I still had a business, and I was earning money, but I realized it could use an upgrade,” she told the University of Arizona. “I didn’t know what was going on in the greater market, and when you hear about things like AI and data mining, you don’t really know what to make of that. I knew I needed to improve myself and started looking for courses.”
Gupta, who already held a Master’s degree in journalism and had been running a business in India, enrolled in the Eller College of Management’s graduate program in business analytics. She became one of the first students in the college’s Chandler-based business analytics cohort and took on a mentorship role as a student worker, helping to refine the curriculum and support peers navigating the challenges of studying in a nonnative language.
“Everything involves data now,” she said. “Business analysts study client and competitor data, product information – whatever information helps you run a business – and use the latest tools and techniques to take that organization to the next level.”
Despite balancing coursework, parenting, and financial responsibilities, Gupta thrived academically. “When I started my coursework and saw how much hard work was involved, I was worried. But I wanted to do this, and I even made the dean’s list,” she said. “Recently, my eldest daughter told a college interviewer that her mom is her idol. I never thought she would say that.”
Gupta co-founded Playfection, a company that redesigns family entertainment centers to make them more inclusive. She is also working on a headset-free, AI-powered augmented and virtual reality platform called Naked Eye and is writing a memoir, Ashes to Armor, which may be developed into a screenplay.
“My eldest daughter told me that I should write my life story so that I could inspire other people,” Gupta told the University of Arizona.
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