Campus Life

Texas A&M’s Accounting Program Has Most Underrepresented Ph.D. Graduates, Faculty In U.S.

A first-ever survey of top 50 programs found that Mays tops the list in both categories.
By Kiri Stanford, Texas A&M University Mays Business School November 18, 2020

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An article in a forthcoming issue of the American Accounting Association Journal, Issues in Accounting Education, summarizes the results of a survey that found that the James Benjamin Department of Accounting at Mays Business School has the most underrepresented Ph.D. graduates and the most underrepresented accounting faculty of any top business school in the country.

The essay, the first-ever report of its kind on the state of the accounting academy, Towards a More Inclusive Accounting Academy, details the state of underrepresented minority Ph.D. graduates and faculty in the top 50 accounting departments.

The number of underrepresented minorities in accounting has nearly tripled in the last 24 years, largely to the credit of The Ph.D. Project, according to the article’s authors. Despite this, the proportion of underrepresented minority faculty remains less than 5% of all accounting Ph.D. faculty.

In 2015, Mays Business School began a strategic planning process for which diversity, inclusion and engagement was a focus area.

“I am proud that our department is receiving recognition for its longstanding commitment to diversity and inclusion among Ph.D. graduates and faculty,” said Nate Sharp, the Nelson D. Durst Endowed Chair in Accounting and head of the James Benjamin Department of Accounting.

The department is currently ranked second in the nation by Accounting Today’s CPA Success Index and by Eduniversal, and thirteenth among public graduate programs by U.S. News & World Report.

This article by Kiri Stanford originally appeared on the Mays Business School website.

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