DATE: August 4, 2008
 The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) has honored Bryan Dean, a 2007 graduate of the University of Washington's Michael G. Foster School of Business, with its Elijah Watt Sells Award, honoring outstanding performance on the Uniform CPA Examination. The award is granted annually to the ten candidates who both pass all four sections of the rigorous licensing exam on their first attempt and post the highest cumulative scores.
Of the graduating class of Foster accountants who took the CPA exam in 2007, 66.7 percent passed on their first attempt – earning the Foster School of Business the 9th best passing rate in the nation, according to the National Association of State Boards of Accountancy, the organization that oversees the CPA exam.
Dean's performance places him in the top 10 of some 26,000 candidates nationwide who attempted all four sections of the CPA exam last year, and more than 69,000 who tried at least one section.
"I was a good student, so I was hoping to pass," said Dean, now an audit associate at the Bellevue, WA, accounting firm of Clark Nuber. "But I definitely didn't have expectations of doing this well, so I was pretty excited."
The Seattle-area native earned his BA degree in accounting and finance from the Foster School in June 2007, posting a cumulative 3.94 GPA. He was active in the professional organization Beta Alpha Psi and interned two summers at Clark Nuber before joining the firm’s audit team a few months after graduation. He used the intermission wisely, getting married and studying intensely for the CPA exam.
"The Foster School prepared me really well for the exam in a couple of ways," Dean said. "It helped develop my work ethic so that when it came time to study for the exam, I was already used to working really hard.
"Also, a lot of the CPA exam is academic, conceptual. Work experience helps, but academic experience is really valuable on the exam, and I felt like I had great preparation at the UW. My classmates were great to work with. The atmosphere was the right mix of competition and collaboration. And the faculty were great – very knowledgeable and helpful."
Dean comes from a family of Huskies. Both of his parents, his wife and his in-laws are UW graduates. His older brother is in the UW Dental School. And his younger brother, Mike, is also at the UW, just beginning his studies in accounting at the Foster School of Business. "He's a great student, really motivated," said Dean.
Look out, CPA exam.
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