BATON ROUGE – A group of LSU students will represent the University in a key national competition.

LSU announced Tuesday via a news release that a team of six E. J. Ourso College of Business students will advance to compete in Deloitte’s national 2022 Audit Innovation Campus Challenge, or AICC.

The LSU team is one of 12 teams selected for the national competition out of 45 colleges and universities.

Team members are Brooks Belanger of Shreveport, La; Kaitlyn Bowlin of Bossier City, La.; Veronica Cannon of Houston; Carly Carpenter of Baton Rouge, La.; Michael Fernandez of Covington, La; and Kyle McDonald of Celina, Texas.

In this annual competition, teams must demonstrate how cutting-edge audit technologies could be applied to a real-world business issue.

This year’s challenge statement asks students to explore the role of the audit and assurance profession in companies’ environmental, social and governance (ESG) reporting. For the preliminary round, teams submitted written submissions for evaluation by a panel of judges consisting of Deloitte audit and assurance professionals. 

“Participating in the challenge as a team leader led me to grow exponentially in terms of coordinating schedules, as well as prioritizing and delegating work,” said Carpenter, a junior accounting major with a concentration in internal audit. “Throughout the challenge, I recognized the importance of asking my peers for their thoughts. Some of the most effective aspects of our submission were only included after noticing that a participant had fallen silent and making a point to ask for their opinion. Learning to create balance in a group setting and not allowing anyone to dominate the decision-making ensured we put our best, most creative idea forward.” 

The student team was supported throughout their preparation by faculty advisor Sanaz Aghazadeh, assistant professor in the Department of Accounting, and Deloitte advisors Patrick Brandau, partner, and Helen Karam, manager.

“Participating in the AICC has shown me the diverse career paths within the field of accounting,” said Belanger, a sophomore. “I learned a lot about the field of ESG and the broad scope of accounting. For example, I was previously unaware data other than financial data could be audited.”

AICC is a national program hosted by the Deloitte Foundation and Deloitte’s Audit Innovation group. The competition helps students test their thinking and research skills and promotes the development of professional skills like networking and communication.

This win represents the fourth time that an LSU team was selected to advance to nationals in AICC’s seven-year history. The 8th annual national AICC will be held in April of 2022 at Deloitte University in Westlake, Texas.