Monday, June 08, 2009
Accounting team wins national competition for second consecutive year
 A team of accounting students from the University of Southern Indiana has won first place in the national Student Case Competition sponsored by the Institute of Management Accountants (IMA) for the second year in a row.This was the fourth straight year for USI College of Business students to qualify for the national finals and the first time for USI to have two of the final four teams. Other teams in the final round of competition represented North Carolina State University and Wright State University. The finalists competed June 7 at the 90th IMA Annual Conference and Exposition in Denver. As qualifiers for the "final four," each of the two USI teams received an award of $3,000. The winning team received an additional $2,000. Students on the winning team were accounting majors Ashley Hancock, Anand Pandit, Yekaterina Shirokova, and David Ubelhor, all of Evansville. Also competing for USI was the team of Kiersten Deig and Matt Garza of Evansville Angela King of Santa Claus, Indiana and Anna Shade of Henderson, Kentucky. Faculty sponsors were Dr. Brian McGuire, associate dean of the College of Business and professor of accounting, and Jeanette G. Maier-Lytle, instructor in accounting. Teams from universities throughout the country entered the first round of IMA competition. To qualify for the finals, each team prepared a 15-minute DVD presentation and submitted it for blind judging. Four teams were chosen to make live presentations in the final round. In the finals, each team's 15-minute presentation was followed by a single question from the judges. The case for the 2009 competition required the students to develop recommendations that would help the academic advising department of a fictitious university's college of business manage its operations and costs strategically. McGuire said, "Both USI teams did very well, and both teams arrived at different solutions that provided creative approaches to a complex situation. The team that won offered many innovative techniques, including SWOT [strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats]] analysis, activity-based budgeting, and a balanced scorecard approach, in their recommendations." Judges were selected from industry and academia across the country. USI accounting students are experienced competitors. Two students on the national championship team - Ashley Hancock and David Ubelhor - were members of the USI team that took first place in the 2008 case competition sponsored by the Indiana CPA Society. USI teams have won that competition five years in a row. King made her second trip to the IMA finals. She was a member of USI's first-place team in 2008. She also was on the 2007 team in the INCPAS competition. McGuire said that two characteristics made this year's national competition unusual. It was only the second time that two of the final four teams represented the same university. It was only the second time that the same university has won two years in a row. All final four teams were recognized at an awards luncheon during the conference. The Student Case Competition is sponsored annually by IMA to promote sound financial/accounting analysis and presentation skills. IMA is an organization for management accounting and finance professionals. It has about 70,000 members worldwide. Betty Vawter News and Information Services bvawter@usi.edu |
Copyright © 2013 University of Southern Indiana. All rights reserved.