'I wanted to build more of a career around accounting'

Dominique Kurth first began moving toward a career back in the fall of 1998, when she met a certified public accountant while opening the East Anchorage location of the Alaska Club early on weekdays.

"He was impressed I was there every morning to open the club before 5 a.m. and asked if I wanted to work for him," Kurth said of that CPA, Mark Schneiter. " I said no. But I had that and two other jobs; I grew tired of splitting my sleeping hours, catching z's whenever I had a few minutes. I was lucky enough that he asked me again in January 1999 and I went for it."

She worked as Schneiter's receptionist, then branched out into doing some contract work in bookkeeping and accounting. In 2009, Kurth decided to return to college and enrolled at UAA with the goal of pursuing an accounting degree.

"I did not think I would be back in school at this point in my life, but I am delighted to be here," she said.

Next year, Kurth expects to receive UAA bachelor's degrees in accounting and finance.

"Accounting is a pretty safe degree," she said. "You can get work anywhere, anytime. I went back to school because I wanted to build more of a career around accounting, wanted to be able to support myself more fully without having the uncertainty of little contract clients."

Full-time work to full-time school

Kurth, an East High graduate, attended the University of Oregon from 1995 to 1998, seeking an environmental sciences degree.

"Unfortunately, my life situation changed," she wrote. "I didn't finish the degree in Oregon for many reasons, some of which are the timing of other life issues and the cost associated with the future reward potential of the career."

When Kurth resumed her studies, this time in UAA's College of Business and Public Policy's accounting program, she enrolled in just a couple of courses a semester since she was also working full time.

That strategy, however, created difficulties and frustrations.

"When working on a degree like accounting, what you do builds onto prior classes," she said. "For me, some of these classes were several years ago. I was watching all these students go past me and graduate. I got frustrated and just decided to go for it. With the support of my family, I was able to do that."

She moved from full-time work and part-time school to full-time school and part-time work in the fall of 2013 and delved into her ambitious double major: accounting and finance."Accounting and finance pair really well together," Kurth explained.

"Accounting is a history of what's happened with a business-reviewing, reconciling for the prior period. You can use that data to forecast and perform analyticals to better understand the financial position of the business. Finance uses that historical data to forecast future prospects, future business ventures, the outlook for the business itself."

What were some of her most engrossing academic discoveries at UAA?

"Two of my favorite classes were statistics classes," she said. "I'd heard nightmare stories about statistics, but statistics allowed me to take what I learned and apply it to give sound analytical advice based on actual information-not just a guess. You can use statistics to bring in industry factors and economic factors to give clients sound business advice. It pulls it all together for me and provides a useful tool. It makes me feel fulfilled to know how to provide this type of advice to clients."

Having fluency in working with numbers smoothed Kurth's path to a certain extent, but mastering the skill of analyzing numbers was much more challenging.

"I'm not the strongest student," she said. "For some it's second nature, I have to work harder at it. You need to focus on what the client needs and understand the business they are in. The accounting and the math behind it are a supportive tool."

Growing deep roots

Kurth has flourished at UAA. She's earned a near-perfect grade-point average (3.94), volunteered as a tutor in the accounting lab and joined the accounting club, where she served as vice president for the 2014-2015 academic year. She is now serving the club in a new appointed position-board mentor.

"It is a rewarding experience where I was able to share my enthusiasm for accounting," she said. "I coordinated the accounting club's monthly volunteer visits to Beans Café and attended as often as I could, as it was definitely one of my favorite experiences."

In May, she traveled to China with eight other students to explore economics, accounting and business. Each student had to have a research project mapped out. Kurth opted to examine the differences between American and Chinese people in their savings behavior.

"We learned about the economy of China, how the universities work," she said. "We visited five cities in 15 days, took a river cruise on the Yangtze River, flew back from Shanghai."

'It's changed my life'

Kurth worked as an assurance intern this summer with BDO USA, an international accounting firm, in its Anchorage office.

"It was really fun, and I learned so much," she said. "Internships are very important. They provide an opportunity to find out if the employer you are interested in will work for you, if it's a good fit with the culture of the company."

The company offered Kurth a job; she graduates in May and will begin working part time in July as she prepares to take five rigorous CPA exams.

"The following year once I have all my exams passed, that's when I'll go full time," she said. "Going back to school at my age is difficult, to say the least. It's a long journey-exhausting and overwhelming at times. There are times I wonder if I'm going to make it; it seems like I've been doing it forever. Sometimes I see the light at the end of the tunnel and sometimes the tunnel seems really long."

Still, Kurth remains determined and exhilarated at what lies ahead.

"Once I started on this path, I've been set on it," she said. "It's changed my life, the direction of my future. But with the help of family, friends and peers, I'm going to graduate next spring."

Written by Tracy Kalytiak, UAA Office of University Advancement