Steve Pearce

Major: M.B.A.
Hometown: Hobbs, N.M.

 Successful business owners Cynthia and Stevan Pearce of Hobbs took some ribbing for going back to school for their M.B.A.s.

“We used to have people tease us, ‘What are you going to do? Give yourself a raise or a promotion?'” Cynthia says. “Steve was always looking for ways to grow and expand his knowledge. My philosophy is that education is such a wonderful catalyst for finding solutions.”

Cynthia, who earned both bachelor’s and master’s degrees in business from ENMU, and Steve, now a U.S. Congressman, took a nontraditional path to graduate school.

As owners of Lea Fishing Tools, an oilfield services company, they committed themselves to a daily 100-mile drive from Hobbs to Portales for their first summer session. That fall, they settled into distance education classes in Hobbs with monthly trips to Portales for face-to-face presentations.

“All the classes we took were beneficial to us. Marketing, accounting, finance and personnel management were applicable in our lives,” Cynthia says. “We had close relationships with our key professors."

As the Pearces’ knowledge grew, so did their business. The staff at Lea Fishing Tools expanded from four to 40 employees within 10 years. The company won a 2001 VIVA Award, short for vision, investment, vitality and action, from the New Mexico Association of Commerce and Industry.

Though they sold the business in 2003, the Pearces maintain close ties to Eastern. “Now we exchange information with the faculty,” Cynthia says.