Fall has come!

School started yesterday. I'm really excited for this quarter - taking Intermediate Accounting, Business Finance, Marketing Concepts, Business Communications for Accounting, and a choir class. Monday and Wednesdays will be long (8 hours of class on Mon, 6 hours on Wed) but I only have one class on Tues/Thurs and NO CLASS on Friday!

I've been meeting with advisers the last couple days and they've helped ease many of my anxieties. Bill Wells (former Acctg prof) informed me that there ARE options to do Big 4 Accounting (or even acctg at a large firm) and still help kids in Africa. He said KPMG has (or at least had) a small, but decently-sized nonprofit segment and he could connect me with someone at Clark-Newton over on the Eastside. (He said Clark-Newton is fully nonprofit and they're the biggest nonprofit firm over on the Eastside). My academic adviser helped me sketch out a graduation plan and it looks like I'll be graduation in Spring of 2011 (instead of 2010, and with a French minor!) so that I'll have enough credits to take the CPA exam.

As it turns out.. I am no longer taking that Tax Course that I was so excited about. A good friend of mine talked me out of it, because I probably would have lost my sanity and good spirits if I loaded up 16 credits (5 classes), 6 hours/week for the tax course (+homework, probably), work, xAct, and a social/family life. I'm really thankful to her and my dad for encouraging me not to stretch myself too far...

Well, I'm off to an info session with EY (Ernst & Young, one of the Big 4 firms). Tonight I'll be going to the BAP (Beta Alpha Psi - an honors Acctg/Finance organization) Welcome BBQ... so much to do, so much excitement! It will be a fun quarter.

Jessica K. Nguyen
Accounting, Finance Class of 2011
Michael G. Foster School of Business
University of Washington, Seattle
accountingforAfrica.blogspot.com