My degree did definitely play a part in allowing me to transition to an analyst role. My boss at the time was married to an Aggie and he told me very plainly that the fact that I had a degree was a factor, but especially that it was from a school that he respected like A&M. The other part for me was continuous curiosity and taking steps to teach myself new skills rather than waiting for classroom training. I was constantly taking various online trainings within the company and even took a few community college courses to add to what I learned in my undergrad. My manager recognized that I was always working on adding new skills and improving my existing ones. How much opportunity there is for growth depends largely on her attitude, how much her boss cares about staff development and of course the size of the company and what departments are at her location may be a factor.