Mission Statement
The George W. Daverio School of Accountancy at The University of Akron provides students with the educational background to become competent and responsible accounting professionals. With a rich history of (i) accounting education that serves both traditional and non-traditional students and (ii) close relationships with the professional community in Northern Ohio, we emphasize undergraduate and masters-level education with an applied focus. The School offers a Bachelor of Science degree in Accountancy, a Master of Science in Accountancy, and a Master of Taxation.
The School stresses a learning environment that places primary importance on student success through effective teaching, complemented by faculty scholarship, interaction with the professional community, and service. Success in accomplishing our mission is evidenced by graduates who will:
- Demonstrate knowledge, understanding, and ability to apply core accounting principles, standards, and methods in such areas as financial reporting, cost management, auditing, tax, and systems.
- Have effective written and oral communication skills as applied to business and accounting.
- Demonstrate ability to contribute to problem-solving and decision-making through professional research, analysis of complex data, integration of information from multiple sources, use of information technology, and creative thinking.
- Understand professional responsibilities and methods for identifying and addressing ethical dilemmas in business and accounting.
- Work effectively in teams and in diverse settings that include individuals with varying educational background, experience, gender, age, race, or national origin.
To be responsive to the professional community that we serve, we endeavor to graduate well-educated students who are prepared to contribute in an increasingly complex and diverse economy. To achieve this end, we seek to attract and retain high quality faculty and staff, and emphasize scholarship that contributes to practice and to teaching.
Values
The School seeks to create a broad teaching and learning community that emphasizes the collective role of students, staff, faculty, and administrators in the education process. Collectively, our learning community values the following:
- Ethics and professional responsibility – We adhere to the ethical expectations of the professional accounting community, the academic community, and the society at large.
- Active and continuous learning – We offer opportunities for all participants in our teaching and learning community to be active and continuous learners through formal education programs and through formal and informal professional development activities. Learning how to learn is a vital element of our value system as it is a necessary prerequisite for continuous learning.
- Outreach and engagement – We proactively reach out and engage our learning community and our stakeholders in the education process through traditional classroom activities as well as activities and initiatives that take us outside the traditional university classroom.
- Inclusive excellence – We believe that all students, regardless of demographic characteristics and educational background, should have an opportunity to receive a high quality learning experience. Furthermore, we believe that all participants in our learning community are critical links in a network of relationships and talent that fosters inclusive excellence.
- Relevance and responsiveness – We believe that our curriculum, our scholarship and our co-curricula activities should be both relevant and responsive to the needs of the stakeholders that we serve.
Strategic Vision
Undergraduate and masters degrees in accounting and taxation offered by the George W. Daverio School of Accountancy shall be viewed by students and employers as the preferred programs among public colleges and universities in Northern Ohio.