EDITOR'S NOTE: This story was originally published in the August issue of GCU Magazine, available in the purple bins across campus or digitally. You can find digital copies of previous magazines here and the latest news about the university at news.gcu.edu.
Story by Mark Gonzales, Izabela Fogarasi and Lana Sweeten-Shults
Photos by Ralph Freso/GCU News
Earning a degree at Grand Canyon University does not guarantee graduates a job at Whatnot. But Elisha Fronda knows a few of the ingredients in GCU’s secret sauce when it comes to preparing students for jobs.
“GCU students are very capable and humble and willing to learn,” said the GCU business and sports management alumnus, who packed boxes at a Scottsdale garage as the company’s first full-time employee.
He’s now the digital marketing influencer manager for Whatnot, where shoppers buy and sell items in online video auctions, from Pokémon cards to comics.
Like Fronda did, everyone starts in customer support or the warehouse – the basics – then works up to, say, the trust and risk team, sales or partnerships.
Whatnot employs 32 GCU alumni – and it’s not the only employer with a penchant for hiring Lopes.
The Arizona Diamondbacks baseball franchise, construction firm Hensel Phelps and health care company Terros Health also are all in.
“The employers working with GCU Career Services consistently use words such as excited, engaged, service-minded, collaborative, driven and professional to describe how our students are showing up in the workplace,” said Aysha Bell, the department’s executive director. “ … Employers have even reached out to us after hiring a student for the first time, wanting to build a relationship so they can have more of our incredible students in their company.”
In 2025, Whatnot hired 18 GCU graduates as agents, the same year it amassed $8 billion in sales and doubled its valuation to $11.5 billion. It has worked with major digital creators, including MrBeast.
“I knew I was going to have to eat dirt for the first few years to even get into a decent role. That was kind of the mindset that I had, and I know a lot of people have here,” said Fronda, who was slated to work for the Phoenix Suns before the pandemic changed his plans.
That willingness to learn was the mindset, too, of fellow alum Bryan Byerly, a business administration graduate who rose in the ranks to become a Whatnot trust and risk associate. He discloses policy or community guideline violations that could result in removing, suspending or banning accounts.
Jordan Schager, a 2022 sports management graduate, said GCU taught him real-world skills, such as business research and marketing, that don’t apply to his Whatnot job directly but helped him adapt to its culture.
“Our culture here is moving comfortably fast, and at GCU they prepare you, in a sense, to do that. You take on multiple jobs, wear multiple hats, and that's kind of what I do, even as a customer service representative,” he said.
Alumnus Dylan Irwin, who graduated in 2022 with a degree in psychology and nutrition sciences, works for Whatnot as a senior specialist.
“A lot of it is just figuring it out,” Irwin said. “There’s no playbook for Whatnot. At the time it was just really, ‘We’re building this product, go figure it out, go build it and work with the team.’”
That Whatnot go-build-it mindset echoes the entrepreneurial culture that pervades campus, whatever the major.
As GCU entrepreneurship chair Tim Kelley has said, “I think our culture is to grab back onto it and say, ‘The barriers have never been lower to be an entrepreneur.’ Just do it. Go for it. Start anything.’’’
Whatnot entrepreneurs who are GCU alums belong to a group chat to keep that connection alive, and that group chat keeps expanding.
Those alums look up to Fronda, who continues to hire and promote GCU students.
“It definitely inspires you to kind of be like, ‘Hey, I want to be an Elisha one day,’ or ‘I want to kind of be my own person,’” Schager said. “But Elisha kind of set the foundation for a lot of GCU students, and that's why they're still recruiting from there today.”
Fronda also continues to be a presence at campus job fairs, looking for students with a certain quality.
“‘Get in and earn it’ has been the pitch that we've had with people, and it's been one that's resonated,” Fronda said. “We continue to do that, because when I first started here, there were five people, and now we're pushing over 1,000 employees."
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While there isn’t a GCU alumni group chat at Terros Health’s 27th Avenue Health Center, Lareina Cota only has to look across the hallway to see fellow GCU graduate Cathleen Peterson.
Not only do they serve their community at the nonprofit health center, an oasis of calm in the busyness of west Phoenix, but both earned their master’s degrees from the university.
And they’re not the only alumni in the building.
Clinical case counselor Francisco Diaz, whose undergraduate is in sports psychology, also makes up a strong Lopes-Terros contingent at the center.
Ray Young, senior director of external affairs for Terros Health, can’t say exactly how many graduates the company employs.
“But it’s a lot,” he said.
What he can say is why GCU alums are sought after by Terros at its 14 Arizona health centers.
“They’re very well-rounded,” he said. “We know that GCU is a reputable organization.
“And the programs are robust.”
Heather Cepek, Terros manager of recruiting and human resources, shared with GCU News in a 2025 article, “When we see GCU on a resume, we are going to assume they have great work ethic. They are usually dedicated. … They have a goal in mind, and they are not afraid to pursue it.
“We like that.”
But it goes even deeper than that, said Young, who sits on the advisory board for the university’s College of Humanities and Social Sciences.
“GCU is a trusted community partner.”
Terros partners with GCU on the 27th Ave. Collab, a community coalition that includes the university and some 80 churches, businesses, government entities and nonprofits working to improve neighborhood safety.
Terros also has helped CHSS with accreditation for its counseling programs, partnered with GCU in volunteer events and has hosted students in internships and clinicals.
“The missions align. We want to give back. We want to create healthier communities, we want to educate the community,” Young said, and GCU does the same, educating and giving back to the neighborhood through its five-point community plan.
When it comes down to it, “It’s all about partnering, because you can’t do it alone.”
That partnership extends to employing students in internships and alums in jobs, like Francisco Diaz, who was referred to Terros by a GCU alumnus from another clinic location.
Although Diaz didn’t have the driving experience needed for the position he originally applied for, which included home visits, he was sent to the 27th Avenue location.
“The same day, they gave me the offer to work here.”
What Diaz thinks makes GCU students invaluable?
“From the two years I was at GCU, everybody was friendly. It was surprising,” he said.
He believes grads bring that intrinsic joy with them.
Cathleen Peterson said there’s a strong sense of faith that pervades what the university does.
“I’ve identified with the Christian faith most of my life,” she said.
It’s something she relied on during the master’s process. It took Peterson five years to finish her degree while working full time. She went through a messy divorce, remarried, had two children and took time off for her son’s multiple cleft palate surgeries.
Graduating, she said, was “a very proud moment.”
The assessment clinician works with adult probation as part of Terros’ Bridging the Gap re-entry team, echoing the missional work at GCU to serve her neighbors, help transform people’s lives and make a difference.
Behavior technician Lareina Cota also wants to make a difference. She said she knew at a young age that she wanted to be a therapist.
“I ended up getting therapy when I was young. ... They made me feel very comfortable. I was like, ‘Oh, I want to do that for somebody else.’”
She did that in ambitious fashion, setting a goal to earn her degrees before she was 30 years old.
What she learned at GCU that she thinks gives her value in her position at Terros is what professor Dr. Anna Johnson taught her: “Grace. Having grace with yourself, with your patient, with your family.”
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The Arizona Diamondbacks, like Terros and Whatnot, also have found value in hiring GCU alumni.
Nate Downs went from Arizona Diamondbacks intern to part-time work in GCU’s IT department to a full-time security operations center job with American Express after graduating with his bachelor’s in IT and cybersecurity.
But the Diamondbacks weren’t quite done with him and reached out with a full-time job.
Now, as the franchise’s IT and cybersecurity manager, he has hired GCU alumni and students, knowing firsthand the kind of hands-on experience they receive. GCU’s recent emphasis on preparing students for industry certification – vital in IT and cyber – is a boon, too.
“That’s huge for getting interviews and being able to get them set up to answer questions and be ready for real-world experiences," Downs said. "Personally, I’ve had a lot of professors who worked with me a lot on stuff as well.”
The Diamondbacks employ more than a dozen GCU alumni in the marketing, community, ticketing, ballpark operations, corporate partnerships and IT departments.
“I didn’t really know there’s a business behind the actual baseball team until I started working there,” said Downs, who played GCU Club Baseball.
He said one recent hire from GCU earned a full-time job because he learned and adapted much faster than the other applicants.
Diamondbacks hire Mackenzie Decker had no interest in sports until a friend told her about the Sports and Entertainment Business Club at GCU. Her involvement with the club helped her land a spring training internship with the Athletics after attending a campus job fair.
“I met my future boss (A.J. Gioglio), and he helped mentor me through my last two years of school,” said Decker, an account executive in group events and hospitality. “I took that opportunity and stayed connected with him, and he ultimately hired me when I graduated.”
Decker, who earned bachelor’s degrees in business management and marketing and advertising in 2024, credited GCU for helping sharpen her people, communication and leadership skills.
“GCU puts you in a lot of situations that make you feel uncomfortable at first, but it forces you to learn not only to manage them but be successful with them,” Decker said. “It opened me to what the different styles of leadership are and how important servant leadership can be.”
Tristan Goldhammer, a 2020 graphic design/advertising graduate, is a five-year D-Backs employee who’s now the manager of Clubhouse Creative, the franchise’s in-house design agency. Her team includes two graphic designers and one junior graphic designer – all GCU alums.
Not only did she learn the software she works on while she was a student, but she said, “They also gave me good character skills so I could be a good employee, just be willing to work.”
Goldhammer, who grew up a baseball fan in Southern California, applied for a graphic designer position with the Diamondbacks her junior year.
“I had no idea you could do anything like this for a Major League Baseball team,” she said.
Goldhammer recalled less than a handful of GCU alums were working for the D-Backs when she started as a full-time employee in 2021.
Now there are so many.
“Having them was so much comfort. … It feels like almost every other intern we’ve hired comes from GCU,” Goldhammer said. “It’s really cool to see GCU get on the board. I had someone once tell me, ‘We don’t have many GCU employees, but we hire from there because we know they’re going to be good workers and good people.’
“That sentiment has resonated throughout the organization and been evident just as far as how many GCU alums they’ve hired, especially as of late.”
Decker was amused to learn that someone in D-Backs operations was her resident advisor at Willow Hall when she was a freshman.
“Even if I wasn’t at GCU at the same time as them, there’s still a sense of community.”
***
Contractor and construction company Hensel Phelps first started looking to hire GCU students at a career fair two years ago.
The company wanted new hires who would support its mission to empower people’s architectural dreams, transform the industry through collaboration and, ultimately, better the Phoenix community.
The fair drew in Candace Cavaco, whose degree is in engineering with a project management emphasis. She became the company’s first GCU hire and since then, 12 Lopes have joined the Hensel Phelps crew.
“The biggest thing that stands out about GCU students, I would say, is their focus,” said Garett Alexander, talent acquisition and development manager. “Most of the students I have talked to are like, ‘This is what I want, and this is what I am going to do.’ They see the bigger picture and are prepared for that career aspect versus just looking at it as a job.
“We are a family company, and they (GCU graduates) are coming in with that family and teamwork aspect already, assimilating very well into that environment.”
Cavaco started out as a field engineer, turning an architect’s vision into reality by transforming design plans into physical execution.
She said her degree taught her the fundamentals, something the company also emphasizes. Hensel Phelps teaches the basics to build a strong foundation and set up employees so they can move up the career ladder.
“They (Hensel Phelps) really prioritize building you fundamentally from the ground up,” Cavaco said. “Even if being in the field isn’t your end goal, they still put you in that position at least for a little bit so that you can learn why we do the things we do.”
This summer, the company added another alumna, 2026 graduate Kassandra Gomez. Though she earned her degree in biomedical engineering, Gomez was intrigued by Hensel Phelps, which returned for another career fair in fall 2025.
Nervous about the potential career change, Gomez walked around the fair three times until she gathered enough courage to walk up to Alexander, who was staffing the company table.
Gomez, now a Hensel Phelps field engineer, doesn’t regret her decision.
“I’ve been learning how to manage my time, the work ethic and how committed you have to be. At GCU, you have to be committed to your education if you want to go far in life. That’s how it helped me go further (at Hensel Phelps), starting out as a rodman (a surveyor’s assistant), to a field engineer.”
Alexander said, “That is a big thing, where you want to go with the job, because 10 years from now, you don’t want to be in the same position you started in. Having those goals set for yourself is going to help long term. I have noticed a lot of (GCU) students are coming in with that in mind.”
When he looks at who he’ll hire, Alexander said, “I don’t solely look for certain qualifications because it is a bigger picture. It is more so the person as a whole, how they present themselves.
“So it’s not based on qualifications, like on a resume. It is everything else they bring to the table."
