Four Southwestern College students recently attended the Kansas Society of Certified Public Accountants’ annual meeting in Kansas City, Mo.

Jeff Shannon, Nolan Smith, Julia Taylor, and Elizabeth Walz attended the event and were able to network with certified public accountants from the states of Kansas and Missouri.  Patrick Lee, assistant professor of accounting at Southwestern, attended the event with the students and led a training session on professional etiquette.  

Lee says that this was a two-track conference.

“Track one was a professionals/annual meeting track and the second was a college student track,” Lee says.  “In the college track our students were exposed to a professional Issues update given by Mark Koziel, vice president of the Firm Services and Global Alliance of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants; a professional etiquette training that I led; an awards luncheon of the Women to Watch awards and the Men Who Get It award; and finally a Student Connect session where our students were able to network one-on-one with professionals and participate in round table discussions.”

Lee’s training session on Professional Etiquette had 60 to 70 accounting college students in attendance. Lee says they covered the topics of “The Business of You,” social media, and table etiquette.

“This was a great opportunity to learn about what it means to be a professional in the professional world,” Lee says.

Students from Kansas State University, Emporia State University, Tabor College, Southwestern College, and Seward County Community College attended the event.

Lee and his students also traveled to Topeka to meet with 2015 SC graduate Abby Gengler.  Gengler is employed by Wendling Noe Nelson Johnson, LLC.

“Our students met with the firm leadership and Abby for lunch and then Abby gave us a tour of her office and talked with our students on what working at an accounting firm is all about,” Lee says. 

Lee reports that the accounting program at Southwestern College has more than doubled from the 2013-14 school year to the 2014-15 school year.  He also says that three-quarters of the 2014-15 accounting graduates have secured positions with accounting firms since their graduation in May 2015.

For more information about the accounting program at Southwestern, contact the college’s admissions department at (620) 229-6326.