It’s great idea to start your accounting career as soon as possible. I am currently sophomore in a four-year university. I love accounting so much that every day I sit in front of compute screen looking and reading accounting news for at least 2 hours. Accounting is nothing more than rules and rules that the best way to master accounting is practicing and practicing everyday just like playing music. Of course for me accounting is somehow a little bit tedious than music ‘cos accounting are rules while music is an entertainment. However, according to me, accounting and music have two common things: passion and patience. You need passion because like I said accounting has too many rules to remember that without any interest you will easily get bored with accounting. You need patience for the same reason. Some people say you also need talent but for accounting I don’t think that is as important as for music. (I have learnt guitar for 7 years and now accounting:D)
We are living in a competitive world; if you want to succeed you have no choice but be good at one thing and only one thing (you can be good at more than one but that’s really rare). Businesspeople are good at making money; auditors are good at examining financial statements; accountants are good at preparing financial statement, etc. The “good” here doesn’t mean you know all the accounting rules but understand how and where to apply them. It’s like when an experienced musician improvises; he doesn’t know the song he plays in advance but the melody keeps coming to his mind while performing. Good accountant is the one who knows how to prepare complete and error-free financial statements, record business transactions fast and properly or reconcile bank statement with company’s cash balance with ease… To achieve such high level we- accountant majors need to start our goal soon. Especially, within the next few years there will be more and more accountants due to increasing demands from new government laws; we need to be better than other accountants if you want to get a good salary at a famed company. My father usually tells me “be distinguishable from a crowd”; employers only recruit you if you can contribute something exceptional for them.
Here are some useful sources that can help you practice accounting knowledge and help employers recognize your accomplishments:
- IMA 2010 National Student Case Competition by Institute of Management Accountaunts: Teams of students respond to a published case by preparing and submitting a videotaped presentation to judges selected from IMA members. The 2010 finals competition will be held at IMA's Annual Conference and Exposition in Baltimore , MD
- analyze a case
- develop a solution
- present it to an audience
- receive recognition for their efforts
- Project Management Institute (PMI): has a wide range of scholarships for both undergraduate and graduate students; the amount range from $1,000 to full tuition at a particular graduate school. For more information click here.
- Federal Reserve Board: The Divisions of International Finance, Monetary Affairs, and Research and Statistics, offer paid internships for graduate students to conduct research at the Federal Reserve Board.
Internships are offered in the spring, summer, and fall.
Interns work on a topic of their own choosing, usually furthering dissertation research begun before the internship. Preference is given to Ph.D. candidates whose topics are in macroeconomics (broadly defined), international economics, finance, banking, and econometrics. Applications are also welcome from students working in other fields of economics.
- IBM extreme blue: The Extreme Blue™ program is IBM's premier internship program for top-notch students pursuing software development and MBA degrees.
Once selected into the program, you will become part of a team working in one of the 14 Extreme Blue labs worldwide. Your team's challenge is to develop the technology and business plan for a new product or service that addresses an existing market challenge.
Through the program, interns have submitted more than 360 patent disclosures and have made more than sixty open source contributions to the open source community. They helped create solutions for key clients and bring-to-market the next generation of IBM products. Not bad for just 12 weeks of work.
Unlike other intern programs that may relegate you to work on outdated technology, the Extreme Blue teams work on leading technology that helps grow your skills and evolve you into a more attractive candidate in the technology field. Interns in this high-performance environment get to roll up their sleeves and work with "hot" technologies such as Linux-, Web 2.0, Web services and Virtualization.
Click here for more information.
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