News        from ABAC

Michael D. Chason Director of Public Relations ABAC 30 -- 2802 Moore Highway Tifton, GA 31793-2601 Phone 229-391-5055 Fax 229-391-5056 mchason@abac.edu

IMMEDIATE DECEMBER 15, 2005

Alexis Banks talks about her ABAC career with Interim President Tom Call.

BANKS PURSUES DEGREE FAR FROM HOME

TIFTON – Alexis Banks, a freshman family and consumer sciences major, is pursuing her dream of a fashion merchandising degree at Abraham Baldwin College, quite a distance from her native Pittsburgh, Pa., home.

Banks originally planned on attending Arizona State University, but when her grandmother’s health began to fail, she made the choice to stay and take care of her. “I have never regretted that decision,” she said.

When her grandmother passed away, Alexis’ mom traveled to St. Simon’s Island and fell in love with the place. “She called me up saying that she had put a bid on a house, so I decided to stay in Georgia and start looking at colleges,” Banks said.

She went online, and ABAC was one of the first colleges that she found. “I loved the living accommodations, and tuition was reasonable,” Banks said.

“The fact that I could get an associate’s degree in fashion merchandising and still be able to go onto a bigger school was wonderful. And I love the one-on-one attention I can get within the program.”

Banks, who graduated from an all-girls Catholic high school, found college life and being away from home hard at first. “I cried a lot for the first couple of months,” she said. “But I had fantastic roommates here and friends from Pittsburgh kept telling me to stick it out.”

And she did. Soon she became not only a part of the ABAC community, but the Tifton community as well by transferring her work at the local Starbucks in her hometown to the one in Tifton. “I instantly became part of the community and stayed busy so I wasn’t so homesick,” she said.

Banks, who loves Italian culture and has visited Italy every year since eighth grade, is already on the way to her goal of working in fashion merchandising. She has visited such fashion meccas as Milan and Rome, as well as gaining an internship this summer with Ralph Lauren.

Her tastes in designers ran the gamut of the high-end fashions of Oscar De La Renta and BCBG to more casual couture such as Future Pharmacy. “I love their jeans,” Banks said. She even likes looking for fashion finds at the neighborhood Goodwill store.

After completing her ABAC degree, Banks is considering a transfer to the University of Georgia, attending the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD), or heading back north to New York to study at the Fashion Institute of Technology.

Banks hopes that in the future she is working in the field of fashion, ideally in the buyer/seller aspect of the industry. “Fashion merchandising is my love and my passion,” Banks said. “As long as I am in fashion merchandising in some capacity, I’ll be happy.”

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