Mullings over

Phew... it's been a busy week. Lots of planning, lots of deadlines, lots of talking over ideas with lots of different people. But it's been a good week, and I'm surprisingly a LOT less stressed than I expected to be. Got a divine refill in my proverbial tank of productivity/endurance.. =) Here are some highlights since I last updated:

Finance Option. Decided to drop it. Bill Wells, my good ole acctg 215 professor, told me to look at my options (Accounting, Finance, French) and see which one was least beneficial for how much work I put in. I process things verbally, so I talked for a while and at the end of it he said, "It seems like you've already made your decision." "Oh.." I muttered, realizing that he was right. And suddenly, I felt a whole lot less burdened.. =)

Registration/Grad plan. Registered for Winter quarter last Friday morning. Taking:
ACCTG 302, 3 credits, Donna Shores = Intermediate Accounting II: "Concepts and principles of financial accounting. Analysis of controversies and problems related to the measurement of enterprise income and asset and liability valuation."
ACCTG 311, 3 credits, Larry Du Charme = Cost Accounting: "Introduction to the theory of cost accounting; job order, process, and standard cost systems; overhead accounting; problems in accumulation and allocation of costs; decision making with cost data."
IS 300, 5 credits, Izic Chong-Kwon Chon = Introduction to Information Systems: "Fundamentals of information systems, what they are, how they affect organizations. Technical and organizational foundations of information systems, building information systems, managing information system resources. Laboratory emphasizes using computer to analyze, coordinate, solve organizational decision-making problems."
MUSEN 100B, 1 credit, Phyllis Byrdwell = Gospel Choir!
OPMGMT 301, 4 credits, Mehrdad Karimi = Principles of Operations Management: "Examines problems encountered in planning, operating, and controlling production of goods and services. Topics include: waiting-line management, quality assurance, production systems, project management, and inventory management. Computer and quantitative models used in formulating managerial problems."

Upon dropping Finance, I also decided to re-do my graduation plan, which is basically a document where I map out the classes I plan to take and when I'm going to take them. Ultimately, it tells the B-school when I plan to graduate. It's great for accounting majors like me who like to have every single little thing planned out.... Anyway, I ended up finding a TON of classes I like and scheduling myself for 5 class/quarter until I graduate. Unfortunately, I am human and have limits and later realized that.. that's a really INTENSE schedule and probably wouldn't be good for me.

Additionally, if I do a full-time winter internship next year.. then I'll need to do a lot of rearranging. I think I'll draft a few alternative grad plans after my Finance quiz on Monday.

A3W. A3W - Accountants for the 3rd World. It's the (FAKE) product I "made" for my Business Communications project (press kit), which was supposed to be a new product from a company or a joint venture type of thing.. Anyway, the basics of my "product" are that it's a campaign launched by Worldvision International in partnership with the Washington Society of Certified Public Accountants (WSCPA). The product is a service provided to nonprofit organizations doing work in the third world, particularly those in desperate need of technical accounting help and can't afford the work they need done. A3W would come in and do tax preparation, auditing, consulting, and help with paperwork for a very, very low price - some times even for free. It was a really fun project and it was also really cool because this is something I'd actualy like to do someday! I don't know how plausible the idea is, especially considering how in my kit I said we only work with 501 (C)(3)s but I didn't realize that 501(C)(3)s don't pay taxes until my old acctg prof mentioned it to me a couple days later.

BUT.. some day, I would like this idea to come into reality, because I believe that this service would indirectly help NPOs. I chose ones that work in the 3rd world "because every dollar counts." The reason we'd provide the service at such low costs is so the NPOs can focus their monetary efforts on accomplishing their mission, instead of paying huge administrative costs.

Informational interview - more? Yes! Yesterday, I had an informational interview with two nonprofit tax managers at Clark Nuber (!!). They gave me a lot of really great advice and challenged me to think about and reevaluate a lot of things, such as whether I want to go into internal or external (private vs. public) accounting to help kids. They told me about the recruiting process (both of them are involved with recruiting) and gave me some good tips, including a few "what not to do"s. They were very thorough and honest in their answers and I really appreciate them taking time out of their schedules. One thing that made me smile? One of them told me I am "a very unusual accounting major" in that I know precisely where I want to go in the field of accounting. Sometimes, though, I think I can get a little too focused/narrow-minded. I'm working on that part, 'cause I do believe there is a healthy balance between being focused and being open to whatever comes to my doorstep.

Conclusion. I think that's all I'll say for today. I've got some internships lined up for the next couple quarters, but I'll wait until we've got more details sorted out to write about it. Hope everything's well on your ends! =)

Jessica K. Nguyen
Junior - Accounting
Michael G. Foster School of Business
University of Washington, Seattle
accountingforAfrica.blogspot.com