Chasing Horizons: An MBA Journey from Omaha to Japan

An invitation to attend the international picnic during the fall 2023 semester may have inadvertently set Chase Rehder ’24 on a brand-new career path. The senior, who is graduating in May with a BSBA with concentrations in International Business and Marketing, always knew he wanted to contribute to the global economy but was not exactly sure how he would do that.

“Professor Catherine Co invited me to go to the international picnic, and I wanted to network,” Rehder said. It was there he learned about the International Management Course (IMC) at the Institute of Business and Accounting at Kwansei Gakuin University in Nishinomiya, Japan, and his interest was piqued. “I love the interconnectivity of globalization, and working to help countries climb the ladder together. I chose marketing because it comes naturally to me,” he said.

Chase applied and received a full scholarship to study the IMC in Japan this fall. IMC is an English-language MBA program at the Institute of Business and Accounting at Kwansei Gakuin University. You can learn more about the program here: Course Information | Kwansei Gakuin University IBA - Institute of Business and Accounting -.

For Rehder, studying in Japan feels like it was meant to be. “When my mom was in high school, she was an exchange student in Japan and has always kept in touch with her friend who still lives there. I have even traveled there with her when I was 3-4 years old, and now I get to go live there!” Chase said. His mother is already planning her first trip to visit her son and her childhood friend.

Rehder will earn his master’s in business administration degree in Marketing with an International Management slant. The program will take him two years, but his visa is good for five years.

“Japan has a culture for embracing college graduates and large companies there often give recent graduates jobs. I would love to get a job at a company in Japan after I graduate and finish out my visa and then return to the United States after that,” he said.

For someone who once thought that college was not the right path for him, Rehder has certainly changed his mind.

“I did not perform well in my last two years of high school, and I was not planning on going to college. I was an electrician for a year out of high school, but I did not like it, it did not make me fulfilled, and it was not the career path for me. So, I had to reevaluate my life and I decided to pivot. I went to Metro Community College for a year, I worked 30 hours a week at Nebraska Furniture Mart, and I managed to take 50 credit hours in one year at Metro. During that year, I decided that UNO was the best place for me to get my four-year degree. I knew I wanted to major in business because it would give me the best return on my investment. During my first quarter at Metro I fell in love with marketing and case studies and strategies. When I came to UNO I met a girl who was president of CBA’s Collegiate Entrepreneurs’ Organization (CEO) club who was doing her concentration in international business and I loved hearing about the opportunities she had because of that, so I tacked on international business as well, and the rest is history,” Rehder said.

Despite taking a year off, Rehder will graduate from college with the rest of his high school class in May of 2024 and he has been on the Dean’s List every semester.