CSUN Nazarian College Accounting Student Wins Prestigious $10,000 PCAOB Scholarship

Luciana Moreno, a senior in the David Nazarian College of Business and Economics at CSUN, was awarded a prestigious $10,000 Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) Scholarship for the 2018-19 academic year. Moreno is pursuing a bachelor’s degree in accounting and is graduating in the spring semester of 2019. She has been offered a full-time position at Moss Adams LLP, one of the 15 largest public accounting firms in the United States, and will begin working there next July.

“I became interested in accounting because numbers were always my friend throughout middle [and] high school,” says Moreno, “I plan to use my degree to help businesses save money and avoid tax hardships [and] fines. I don’t know if I will stay in public accounting forever, but my main goal is to study for the CPA exam and become a licensed CPA.”

The PCAOB Scholarship program was formed to award eligible students funding through the students’ educational institutions with the monetary penalties imposed by the PCAOB. These scholarships are one-time awards, given to institutions once every five years, which may be used to pay for expenses such as tuition, fees, books, supplies, and equipment for enrollment in the accounting program at each respective university with scholarship recipients. This year, the PCAOB chose one student from each accounting program in 332 institutions to grant scholarships. Moreno was nominated by CSUN’s Accounting Department and joins four other California State University students and two University of California students who were also awarded with the scholarship.

“I was in shock and disbelief, but honored to be nominated for the scholarship. It really meant a lot [to] me.” Says Moreno, “My scholarship gave me peace of mind this semester. It has provided so much relief and has given  me the ability to dedicate more time to studying and focus on my last semester.”

In order to become eligible for the PCAOB scholarship, one must be enrolled in a bachelor’s or master’s degree program in accounting, demonstrate interest and aptitude in accounting and auditing, demonstrate high ethical standards, and must not be a PCAOB employee or a child or spouse of a PCAOB employee.

The Public Accounting Company Oversight Board is a nonprofit corporation established by Congress as a result of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, which required that auditors of U.S. public companies must be subject to external and independent oversight. The PCAOB oversees the audits of these public companies, brokers, and dealers to ensure that both the investors and public interest are protected. In addition, the PCAOB promotes informative, accurate, and independent audit reports.