A team of six accounting students from Brigham Young University’s Marriott School was selected as the National Champion at the sixth annual Deloitte & Touche National Student Case Seminar in Scottsdale, Arizona.
The six team members are Shawn Anderson from Jerome, Idaho; Joelle Critchfield from Sandy, Utah; Tamralyn Davis from Murray, Utah; Daniel Hopkin from Needham, Mass.; Samuel Mulliner from San Jose, Calif.; and Ned Prusse from Southlake, Texas—all graduate students in the Marriott School’s Master of Accountancy program.
BYU was one of only six universities to qualify for the competition. This is the second year in a row the team from the Marriott School has placed within the top two at the accounting competition.
“The objective of this seminar is to help students learn more about the current state of practice and to see and experience some of the challenges we encounter in serving our clients,” said Deloitte & Touche National Director of Recruiting Mark Chain.
Each team was given a unique case for which it had to identify the major accounting issues, develop a research plan and propose a solution. Teams were judged on their identification of relevant accounting issues and the effectiveness of their solutions and presentations.
“I believe that participating in the case study seminar is one of the best learning experiences students can have,” said David M. Cottrell, Marriott assistant professor of accountancy. “Students benefit from the combination of having to research difficult questions and then having to present and defend their solutions to a group of partners who often ask additional questions that students may not have considered.”
To succeed at the competition, students relied heavily on the training they had received from professors.
“We were able to take the concepts and theories we learned in class and apply them to real-life business situations,” Davis said. “Working together as a team, we were able develop practical, effective solutions to the problems we faced.”
In addition to benefitting from the learning experience, each member of the winning team received a $1,000 cash scholarship.
The Marriott School is located at Brigham Young University, the largest privately owned, church-sponsored university in the United States. The school has nationally and internationally ranked programs in accountancy, business management, information systems, organizational behavior and entrepreneurship. The mission of the Marriott School is to educate men and women of faith, character and professional ability who will become outstanding managers and leaders throughout the world. Approximately 3,000 students are enrolled in the Marriott School’s graduate and undergraduate programs.
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Writer: S. Wade Hansen (801) 378-1512
