Giacomo Battaglia ’25: A Path Less Traveled
Growing up, people are often shown only one clear path to success in life: get your high school diploma then your college degree and fit into society perfectly without making too much noise. Sometimes it’s hard to envision success for yourself when you don’t fit the mold you see represented all around you. However, Giacomo Battaglia, Knauss international business student, decided that he wouldn’t let this box him in and he was going to achieve his goals his own way, on his own timeline.
Giacomo was raised between clusters of snowy mountain peaks in Denver, Colorado. Feeling like an outsider for being part of the LGBTQ+ community, at age 17 he dropped out of high school with a GPA of 4.3 to follow a different educational path and build a new support system.
Eager to begin his college career, instead of obtaining a high school diploma with the peers he grew up with, he went to Bard College at Simon’s Rock early college program where he could obtain college credits and live on campus with other like-minded students. After a year at Bard College, he decided it was time to transfer to a traditional university that had his desired area of study.
Dreaming of leaving the cold and coming to California for an international business degree, Giacomo was originally hoping to go elsewhere, but his father was a proud alumnus of the University of San Diego and suggested he go here.
“I’m very different from my father so it was a place I never thought I would feel comfortable at, but the fantastic international business program drove me here. I realized there was so much opportunity, it was a place where I wanted to be and it turned out to be the best decision I could have ever made,” said Giacomo.
Upon coming to USD, Giacomo set his sights on creating a successful foundation for a career in international business. He knew that he would have more opportunities in the future with experience abroad but decided to take it a step further and participate in the double degree program to receive both a degree from USD as well as one from EM Strasbourg, a French partner university.
“I could not think of a cooler thing than the double degree program here and the opportunities that come with it,” said Giacomo. “The program in Strasbourg lies just on the border of Germany and France so it was almost made for me since I am minoring in those two languages. How many other people can say they have two degrees from two different countries?”
During his time abroad, Giacomo was able to travel all over Europe and experience various cultures, when he had never even left the country prior to coming to USD. He then ended up doing two more study abroad programs after - to Tokyo and Austria. While in France, he gained valuable experience working for the European version of Associated Press (AP) news, AFP, where he translated media materials between English and French. “In France I learned how to be more bold and that confidence helped me significantly in doing well in Europe,” he stated.
During his time in the U.S., Giacomo was determined to make USD feel like home and started breaking barriers to create a sense of inclusivity for not only himself but others around him. At the end of his sophomore year he worked with a peer on starting a chapter of a new fraternity for gay, bisexual or progressive men called Delta Lambda Phi.
The faculty also found a way to connect and support Giacomo and his peers. Professor of Sociology Greg Prieto, PhD, supported him with his participation in an LGBTQ+ program called Out for Undergrad, which is a collection of conferences that pay for students to get flown out to meet with large companies and other students. Giacomo was able to attend the conference in 2024 and delivered a speech on professional vulnerability that Dr. Prieto had assisted him with.
“It was great to see people like me as a head of investments at a banking company,” Giacomo said.
In addition to his involvement in the fraternity, Giacomo became the director of marketing for the international business club and vice president of the American Marketing Association (AMA) USD chapter. He’ll be graduating early this December, with two degrees and the whole world ahead of him, proving that there is no right or wrong way to succeed.
“I’ve been told many times in my life that I am too authentically myself... All of my accomplishments have shown that it’s not in spite of, but because of my openness, that I have been able to succeed in these ways. There is no proper way to be a business person. Nobody has the right to tell you that you will not succeed because of who you are.”
— Jessica Applonie