Busy Season

They say that tax season is the busiest season for accountants. Well, I am here to disagree. I have now applied to 16 different firms for a job and just scheduled my first interview on Tuesday. While its all so intimidating, I am learning so much about the real world. EMU offered me great benefits with friendships and quality teacher-student relationships. JMU offers the slogan "Work Hard, Play Harder". I haven't really seen the "play hard" part of that slogan yet but I keep watching for it out of the corner of my eye. I am also about to enter the month of October which means midterms, midterms, and more midterms. And these are no ordinary midterms, they are the devil disguished as a piece of paper. I had my fraud teacher tell our class yesterday that his tests are almost impossible to pass, the average is usually a low B and only about 3 people get A's on his test. He used to write questions for the CPA exam though so he prepares his tests in the same fashion...oh goody. If that isn't enough to stress me out, I have a group presentation for that same class next Wednesday, 20 minutes of explaining how the Baptist Foundation of Arizona posed as a ponzi scheme and resides as the largest religious fraudalent scheme to occur in history. This class has made me look at everything around me with criminal eyes which is sorta annoying due to the lack of trust in my body now. Following Wednesday, I shall go into a Governmental Accounting and Reporting exam on Friday. This one shouldn't be too bad except accounting for governments and non-for-profit companies is unlike anything I learned for the last 4 years. So its like being a freshmen all over again. Speaking of which, I got a call yesterday to tutor a sophomore in their beginning accounting class. I can only hope that explaining debits and credits to her isn't as hard as I think its going to be but 20 bucks an hour is too good to resist. After those tests, I have my Advanced Taxation test to look forward and rounding out exam month is Financial Management which at this point is the least of my worries due to me having taken multiple other finance courses. Tax will be a killer but I know that I can retake that exam at least 3 times...well you have to take it until you get an 80%! I am at work this morning as I have been for the past 45 minutes. I was just telling my mother how being here in grad school has to be harder than the real world actually. Watching my friends who graduated complain about their life, I just want to punch them in the face. I have a full schedule, work over 20 hours each week in the office as a graduate assistant, take 4 grad classes, pick up shifts at Chili's, and now I'm tutoring. All of my classes require many hours of studying/meeting with groups after class too so when 11:00 rolls around, I fall into my bed exhausted. But with that being said, I'm LOVING it here! I have made several friends who I enjoy very much. It always throws me when I make a joke and these people understand it. Sitting in a class with 70 other people who are just as smart as you and half of them much smarter, its a very different mind set. I am still adjusting to the fact that I'm no longer one of the smartest ones in my classes...I now sit on the lower of the todem pole! :) Anyway, I would tell you stories about my social life except I don't have one. Its slightly depressing to type that but its the truth. Even if a boy wanted to date me, I honestly don't know when I would have time to schedule them in. I penciled several EMU friends in my planner for social time last Friday night and they were appalled that I actually put them in my planner. How to explain to them that's reality for me...well I just gave up. I need to be studying right now rather than typing more since class is coming up quickly but I thought I would end with this list. Who is on the list you may ask...well just take a guess:

Veris Consulting - Denied
Clifton Gunderson LLC
Chess Consulting - Job I REALLY want
Keiter, Stephens, Hurst, Gary, & Shreaves P.C.
Deloitte
LarsonAllen LLP
Baker Tilly
Ernst & Young
Deloitte Consulting
Reznick Group
Grant Thorton LLP
BDO USA LLP
Hantzmon Wiebel LLP
Matthews, Carter, and Boyce
Mitchell, Wiggins, and Co
Yount, Hyde, Barbour CPA
Aronson & Co
Calibre CPA Group
Kearney & Co - Got an Interview on Tuesday!!

Loves,
Ash