Meet the Firms with the UIC Business Accounting Club

Each September, the UIC Business Accounting Club invites students and recent graduates of UIC to Meet the Firms, an opportunity to gain an introduction to Chicago’s professional accounting community and to learn about work opportunities in the field. On last Monday, September 21, students and recent alumni spent the afternoon in the Illinois Rooms of Student Center East with over 30 firms from the Chicagoland area, including the Big Four: Deloitte, KPMG, Ernst & Young, and PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Things kicked off with a reception for the firms and for participating accounting faculty from UIC Business, who were present throughout the event to answer students’ questions about the accounting profession, as well as questions about accounting research and teaching. An hour into the reception, current UIC Business MSA students and members of the UIC Accounting Club received 30 minutes of priority access to the firms, after which the doors were flung wide open and attendees began lining up for a chance to meet firm representatives. Because of the consistently high CPA pass rates among UIC Business students, UIC Business and the Accounting Club have had no problem maintaining strong relationships with firms that want to recruit from the UIC student body.

For some students, the event was an opportunity to make a targeted introduction with a particular firm offering a particular job or internship. Others took a more general approach, spending their hours browsing among the firms in order to explore a general interest in the accounting field. All students were dressed to impress in formal business attire, and almost all were there to practice their networking skills. “Meet the Firms is a great networking opportunity for UIC students,” says Jessica Pawelski, the Club’s VP of Marketing, “but I’ll say that the Club members and MSA students get quite an advantage. Once those doors are opened to everyone, traffic piles up behind each recruiter. I’m not sure whether it’s the information shared at the reception alone or a combination of other factors, but students are eager to meet recruiters and willing to wait.”

Here’s the full list of firms that were represented at the event:

Becker
Bronner Group, LLC
CBIZ & Mayer Hoffman McCann P.C.
CDH
Center for Economic Progress
Chicago Fire Soccer Club
CNA
CohnReznick
Crowe Horwath LLP
Deloitte
EY
Friedman & Huey Associates
Frost, Ruttenberg & Rothblatt, P.C. FROST
Illinois CPA Society
ITW
Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL)
KPMG
Marco & Associates
McGladrey
Michael Silver & Company
Mueller
National Futures Association
Office of the Comptroller of the Currency
Ostrow Reisin Berk & Abrams, Ltd.
Prado & Renteria
PwC
Shepard, Schwartz & Harris LLP
State of California Franchise Tax Board
Topel Forman LLC
True Partners Consulting LLC
Warady & Davis LLP
Weiss & Company LLP
Weltman Bernfield, LLC

Questions about Meet the Firms and the UIC Accounting Club? Email accountingclub@gmail.com.