From the Department Head
It has been an eventful year for the Department of Accounting & Taxation. Our faculty and students continue to make significant contributions to LeBow College of Business. We are able to attract high quality students to both undergraduate and graduate accounting programs, supporting them with high-energy, tenure track faculty, motivated clinical and adjunct faculty, and our excellent committed departmental manager. Everyone is committed to improvements in accounting education for our students.
Our students participate in local and national case competitions, represent LeBow at regional and national conferences and organize many events on campus with alumni and professionals. We are continually proud of the numerous accomplishments of our students.
Our faculty and Ph.D. students have also represented us nationally with publications and conference presentations throughout the year. Their efforts have been invaluable to our department and we applaud all they have done this year.
The construction of the new building is on track. The classrooms on the first four floors will be open in time for the start of classes in September 2013, and all 12 floors will be completed by the end of the year. A grand opening celebration will be held on October 2-3. In addition, tours will be offered at our breakfast CPE event on December 13. Our newsletter contains more detailed information about both events; please join us on campus.
I am excited to announce that we have successfully recruited four new faculty members including two tenure track faculty and two clinical faculty members. In addition to the one-year MS Accounting (MAC) program we launched in 2011 in response to the latest changes in the education requirements of 150 semester credit hours to become certified as a CPA in Pennsylvania, we have also started in 2012 a new two-year MAC program to meet various education and career needs of our students who were not accounting majors in their undergraduate studies.
The Department has continued to work closely with the Provost’s office on developing and delivering the “WrapAround” courses to support students in the accounting foundations courses. The courses are administered by Professor Stacy Kline but the bulk of the support comes from our upper level accounting students. These courses not only enrich students learning experiences, but also improve LeBow’s efforts for student retention.
Further, to improve our students' CPA examination pass rate, we continued to offer a CPA review course to our MAC students. We have expanded the accounting advisory board to better connect with the business community and help enhance the co-op and final placements of accounting graduates. We welcome three new members to the board and thank them for their service: Edward Furman, Debra Martino and Michael Purcell. The expanded board now has 16 representatives from “Big Four,” regional accounting firms and industry who assist the department in faculty and student development and curricular review. I would like to conclude by inviting you to visit us. It is always a pleasure seeing alumni and friends.
Sincerely,
Hsihui Chang, PhD., CPA
Department Head, KPMG Professor of Accounting
