All posts by alexandrianewman

Academics, Alexandria, Student Life, Study Abroad

Czech it Out- Guided Weekend Excursion

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This past summer, the Paris and Prague MPA Summer Programs offered a UT led cultural excursion for the first weekend of the program. The one we went on for the Prague program was fantastic, and it included visiting the following places:

(Warning, this blog post is mostly pictures, because they do such a better job at describing the places we got to visit)

Karlštejn Castle- This was the castle of Charles IV, the Holy Roman Emperor that brought Prague to cultural prominence under his reign. The castle was beautiful and located in the beautiful Czech country side

 

 

 
Pilsner Urquell Factory- Pilser Urquell is the preeminent beer of the Czech Republic, which is saying something because beer is a huge part of the Czech culture. From a manufacturing perspective, this factory was fascinating because only 23 people worked in the factory and they were able to produce enough beer to satisfy a nation of frequent beer consumers.

 

 

Plzen- This town is where US troops came to expel German troops from in WWII. In fact, there is a street called “Amerika” and a monument on the street saying “Thank you USA!” that thanks the US troops and General Patton for what they did for their country.
 

 

Graphite Mine- After spending the night in Plzen, we suited up and headed into the depths of a graphite mine. This was something we will never have the opportunity to see again. The saddest part is we probably will never get to see the equipment again either, which is a little devastating.

 

 

 

Czesky Krumlov- This town was the last stop on our weekend excursion, and was absolutely stunning, The weather was perfect, and the views superb. I could have stayed here all day and still not enjoyed enough of its beauty.

 

 

 

 

Return next week for Part 4 of Ally’s Czech It Out series!

Academics, Alexandria, Student Life, Study Abroad

Czech it Out – UT Classes Abroad

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Visiting the Skoda manufacturing floor in our Safety Gear

As I said in my earlier blog, the MPA summer programs allow you to take two accounting elective courses in a foreign country: one led by UT faculty, and one led by faculty at the host university.

I’ve already discussed the Czech faculty I had the privilege of taking classes with, so now it’s time to talk about my UT faculty led course.

The course was split up between UT Professors Kamas and Koonce. Before I dive into the subject matter they taught, I would like to point out that these courses aren’t like any MPA courses you can take in Austin. Not only are they in a foreign country, but the faculty get to set their own curricula. This means that they get to lecture on whatever they are passionate about, and their passion definitely comes across in their teaching.

Professor Kamas led the first half of the course, and focused on managerial accounting and financial statement analysis. We discussed what considerations international firms take into account in order to manage their profits and strategy effectively. The course material really hit home because Professor Kamas used cases of international firms and brought in his own copious experience of running a business. Professor Kamas had a Big 4 partner come to the classroom and discuss the challenges of moving from the US to a foreign country with our class. We also enjoyed the luxury of seeing what we were learning in the classroom applied to an actual multinational company. We went on a company visit of Skoda (the largest car manufacturer in the Czech Republic), and learned about accounting and the strategy challenges of trying to expand internationally.

The second half of the course was led by Professor Koonce. To give you some background on her course material, Professor Koonce is the top experimental researcher in financial reporting according to the most recent BYU rankings of accounting research (go Professor Koonce!). She introduced us to experimental research in accounting by lecturing on the basics of judgment and decision making and how the concepts overlapped with accounting. This was probably the most fascinating class I have taken in my time in the MPA Program. We are lucky to have such wonderful faculty teaching us, but teaching is such a small part of some of their jobs. So much of their time is dedicated to research, and we really have no idea what is involved in this. Hearing about the basics of what our faculty are up to when they are not in the classroom was an unbelievable experience.

Click here to continue to Part 3 of Ally’s Czech It Out Adventures!

Academics, Student Life, Study Abroad

Czech It Out- Classes in a Different Country

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A group of Texas MPAs overlooking scenic Prague

This past summer, I had the wonderful opportunity to participate in the MPA Summer Program in Prague. This is the first of my many installments called “Czech It Out” where I document my experience abroad.

For those of you unfamiliar with the MPA summer programs, students go abroad for 5 weeks and take 2 accounting elective courses. 1 course is taught by UT professors, and the other by professors at the host university.

Students that venture to Prague attend VSE, the economics school, and take a class on European Accounting in Europe taught by a combination of 3 professors from Prague.

As to be expected there were several cultural differences that students noticed in the classroom. The first of which is that the Czech style of teaching is much more lecture based than the classes of their UT counterparts. They did not really ask for student participation and seemed thrown off when students raised their hands in the middle of lectures.

They also did not “hold our hands” at all. For example, when we asked Professor Zarova what she wanted to see in the group presentation and paper she assigned, she replied “Oh, whatever you feel is important.” Most of us MPAs didn’t know what to do after being provided very descriptive rubrics for each of our projects in Austin.

From the perspective of enhancing your accounting education, I could not recommend a better thing to do. First of all, Czech classes were fascinating in that the country is still recovering from 40 years of communism. I had no idea what an influence communism still played on the Prague culture and economy today. It really hit home when our professors told us that in 1991, when the Soviet Block fell, all their degrees lost all of their value because the only masters and doctorate degrees they could receive were in Leninism and Stalinism. Once communism fell, they had to go to the US and UK to reacquire their credentials in capitalism and learn how the capitalist system worked.

It was also fascinating hearing about US GAAP and IFRS convergence efforts from a European perspective. I never understood why it would be so hard to find a compromise, but after learning the stark cultural and business differences amongst European countries, I have a much better understanding of the complexities that arise with convergence efforts.

Click here to continue to Part 2 of Ally’s Czech It Out Adventures!

Academics, Alexandria

Accelerated Classes

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Accelerated classes can sometimes feel like learning in hyperspeed

Integrated students in the MPA program have an interesting spring semester during their 4th year. For most students, the semester is made up of a combination of a public accounting internship and accelerated classes. My fellow bloggers Jamal and Melissa have been telling their exotic tales of life as an audit intern, because their semester starts with an internship, and they will eventually come back to take their accelerated classes. Tax students, however, start their semester with accelerated classes and then move onto their internship. This means that my fellow 4th year tax iMPAs have been lost in textbooks while our audit friends are getting a taste of the real world.

My fellow tax MPAs and I had to start school on January 2nd. I can’t speak for everyone that was taking the tax accelerated classes, but it was a struggle coming back from a very short winter break and having to sit in 5 hours of lecture for three days straight. The first day back got even harder when in our corporate tax class, Professor Zvinakis announced “The best way to describe the workload in this class is… stunning.” She did ease the burden of the first day back by having Tiff’s Treats, but boy, she was in no way lying about the workload of her class.

I don’t think I have ever had to work so hard to stay afloat in an MPA course. The frequent homeworks, reading assignments, projects, and tests were mentally and physically taxing (pun completely intended). That being said, I have never learned so much in such a short period of time, and it was kind of nice to just completely immerse myself into a new subject. I also I feel I got a lot of hands on experience by being challenged to conduct frequent tax research and complete an expansive tax return for a corporation.

I also really appreciated the class because I feel Professor Zvinakis went above and beyond the call of duty to help us understand the material in a short period of time. First of all, she hosted review sessions that provided us with additional hands on practice of the concepts we were learning in class, despite the fact that she taught for five hours previously. I mean, I’m sure we have MPA faculty that love tax with every fiber of their being, but 6 hours of teaching tax has to be… taxing (sorry guys, I couldn’t resist. The pun ends here, I promise). On top of the additional optional review sessions, there were ample opportunities to ask questions in office hours each day Monday through Thursday.

On a more personal note, I really enjoyed this class because this is the first time in a long time my learning style has been addressed in an accounting class room. What I mean by that is that I have always been very much a big picture person and have had a hard time processing small details (which is just dandy in tax…. Believe me, I have tried to convince myself to pursue something else, yet tax simply fascinates me). But Professor Zvinakis not only taught the little details of corporate tax law, but also connected provisions to current tax policy, and clearly illustrated how certain little details can make huge economic effects.  Tax policy and its effects on the economy is the main reason I am truly fascinated by tax, and what drove my decision to become a tax-track MPA. All the work I was did to process the finesse of corporate tax law helped me understand the reasons that led to certain economic effects and I found it to be reassuring and rewarding.

All in all, it was a fantastic experience, but I am so glad to be done!

Alexandria, Austin, Events, Student Life

Run Austin! (2.0)

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Last year I wrote a blog post about the best places to run around in Austin on a day to day basis, and mentioned a few of Austin’s most famous races. (Click here if you missed it!) Austin has a strong running community and a ton of marathons and races. With spring on the horizon, I thought it a good time to discuss a few of the best races to run in Austin.

My friends and I at the Color Run last year

Let’s start off with the fun races.  Color Run, coming in May (sign up open January 15th!), is one of the most fun and colorful races in Austin! It has a national tour, so you can run the race in other cities around the country. This is a 5K run, about 3.1 miles long, where volunteers throw dry paint at you at the start and after each 1K you complete. You start wearing all white, and finish a colorful mess. Once you finish you are given a bag of dry paint of your own, and there is a massive dance party by the finish line where everyone dances and throws paint. I did it with a few friends last year, and highly recommend the race to runners and non-runners alike.

Warning: Make sure you shower the paint out of your hair (yes, it will get in your hair) as soon as you get home. I didn’t get all of the paint out immediately, and my hair had pink and green sections for a week following the race because I let the paint sit for a few hours. Unfortunately for me, that week after the race was full of public accounting firm career nights. Nothing like colored hair for networking!

Braving the mud with some fellow MPAs

Another fun, and extremely messy, race for everyone to do is the Muddy Buddy. This race, also part of a national tour, is a partner race where you mountain bike and run. There are obstacles throughout the course, including a large mud pit you crawl through with your partner at the end of the race. I particularly enjoyed the costume contest at the beginning, where the funniest costumes received some recognition and appreciation. There are a lot of races in Austin similar to this one, in particular the Warrior Dash and Mud Run.

The Gorilla Run may be one of the strangest races in Austin. Instead of a race t-shirt, each race participant receives a full gorilla costume to run in. Volunteers run dressed as bananas for the gorilla-clad racers to chase through Austin’s streets.

Austin has a number of zombie runs in the winter, where you attempt to outrun zombies as they chase you throughout an urban course.  I have also noticed many “urban-challenge” races as well. These are similar to the TV show “The Amazing Race” where you complete tasks around the city on foot, or take part in a city-wide scavenger hunt.

Come out the the LiveSTRONG half marathon and find me in my infamous Waldo race costume in the crowd!

Finally, I am going to make one final push for something I think everyone in Austin should take part in, whether it be racing or volunteering. I really think everyone should take part in the LiveSTRONG Marathon and Half Marathon while they are in Austin. It is a very energetic and inspiring race that I feel is unrivaled. Only slightly less than 3 weeks away! And, in case you are feeling particularly generous, I am raising money for the LiveSTRONG Foundation as a member of Team LiveSTRONG again this year, and you can see my personal page here.