If You're Going To San Francisco...AAA Will Be There

If you're going to San Francisco between July 31 and August 4, you can catch the American Accounting Association's (AAA's) Annual meeting. I attended the Annual Meeting in Chicago in 2007, and I highly recommend it. The AAA is the professional association for academics, but many practitioners (financial executives, auditors, audit committee members, and others) belong to AAA as well. (I am a card-carrying member of AAA.)

Here are just a few highlights of the AAA Annual Meeting, and the CPE sessions that precede it:

• Conference on Teaching and Learning - with two tracks - one for practioners interested in learning about teaching now or in the future, and one for current teachers - I highly, highly recommend this program, which I attended in its earlier form in 2007; and again in NYC last year; various FEI members have attended over the years and found it a valuable and high level intro to what you'll face if you decide to enter teaching as an adjunct, part time, or full time prof; contact Dee Harris at AAA immediately if you are interested in this program at deirdre@aaahq.org or 941-556-4119, since space is limited.
• XBRL Teaching Workshop - preceding CPE Sessions and Annual Meeting - July 29-30.
• Concurrent CPE sessions take place from Friday evening July 30 - Sun. Aug. 1
• The AAA Annual Meeting takes place from Mon. Aug. 2 - Wed. Aug. 4
• FEI leadership and members speaking at the AAA CPE Sessions/Annual Meeting Panels include (a) Marie Hollein, FEI President and CEO, FEI, on Panel 1.7: "Auditors, Management and Boards: What They Need to Deter Fraud," moderated by Cindy Fornelli, Executive Director, Center for Audit Quality, with additional panelists Eric Allegakoen, Vice President and Chief Audit Executive of Adobe Systems Incorporated, Randy Fletchall, Americas Vice Chair, Quality and Risk Management, Ernst & Young; b) Betsy Rafael, (VP Corporate Controller and Principal Accounting Officer at Apple, Inc.), as luncheon speaker Tues. Aug. 3 from 12:00 - 1:45 on: "The Future of Accounting: A Preparer's Perspective of the Uncertain and Challenging Future of Accounting as Convergence, Rregulation, and New Business Models Meet"; (c) Rick Brounstein (EVP and CFO, NewCardio, Inc.) and Bob Laux (Senior Director of Financial Accounting and Reporting, Microsoft Corporation), on Panel 3.2: "User and Preparer Views on the Financial Statement Presentation Project," along with panelists Dane Mott (Senior Equity Analyst, J. P. Morgan) and Sandra Peters (Head, Financial Reporting, CFA Institute). Moderator is former SEC Acting Chief Accounting Scott Taub, now of Financial Reporting Advisors. This panel was organized by 2009-2010 AAA Financial Accounting and Reporting Section (FARS) Chair Teri Yohn (also an FEI member, and a former SEC Academic Fellow). Another panel featuring FEI member and former AAA President Gary Previts is described further below.
• Panel 5.1, Tues. Aug. 3, 2-3:30: The Pathways Commission (Charting a National Higher-Education Strategy for the Next Generation of Accountants)Moderator: Bruce Behn, The University of Tennessee; Panelists: Bill Ezzell, Deloitte LLP, Gary Previts, Case Western Reserve University (also an FEI member), Judy Rayburn, University of Minnesota, and Denny Reigle, American Institute of CPAs. The concept of charting a national higher education strategy was one issue identified in U.S. Treasury Advisory Committee on the Audit Profession's (ACAP's) 2008 report; the subcommitee on education/human resources was led by Gary Previts.
• Panel 7.5: "Operating an Accounting Blog,"Moderated by: Bill McCarthy, Michigan State University, Panelists: Dave Albrecht, The Summa (Concordia College), Joe Hoyle, Teaching Financial Accounting (University of Richmond), Ed Ketz, Accounting Cycle (Penn State), Francine McKenna, re: The Auditors
  Tom Selling, The Accounting Onion.
• Additional speakers at the AAA CPE Sessions and Annual Meeting each year include prominent members of the SEC, PCAOB, FASB and IASB board and staff.

The AAA Annual Meeting is a great opportunity to learn, mix and mingle with academics, practitioners and regulators. Think about it! But hurry and register soon if you haven't already!

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