UC Davis MPAc Redefines Graduate School with Career Prep, Community Building—and Fun

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One of my concerns about starting graduate school at UC Davis was hearing others say that I might not have much fun.

As an undergraduate at UC Riverside, I was always told to maintain a good GPA while still enjoying myself. That balance was what made my four years as an undergrad so fun.

Yet heading into the UC Davis Master of Professional Accountancy program, the energy felt entirely different.

These are just a few of the warnings I heard from friends who had been through graduate school:

• “It's super-fast-paced; don’t fall behind.”
• “You’ll have to pull so many all-nighters.”
• “This isn’t undergrad anymore.”

So, when I walked into Gallagher Hall at UC Davis on the first day of a Career Builder Bootcamp, I was worried that the MPAc program would be exactly as intimidating as others made it sound.

MPAc Orientation: Week One

After a nice breakfast, we hit the ground running on the first day. The pace was fast and furious with a series of presentations, networking events with different firms and practice pitches.

We heard from EY about careers in assurance, PwC about building careers across service lines, KPMG on audit technology and analytics and Deloitte on tax tech. Faculty and staff also walked us through the CPA exam, MPAc curriculum and best practices for public accounting job searches.

These workshops were an excellent way to get acquainted with the accounting world and learn from some of the program’s alumni.

At the same time, it was amazing to hear so many different perspectives, both from senior managers and alumni. Like me, many of my classmates did not come from accounting backgrounds, so hearing from the speakers was equally valuable.

While meeting the Big Four firms and getting to hear from the alumni was important, half of the fun of boot camp was the activities outside the classroom.

I went into the first day worrying that the environment would be cold and competitive, but every meal, break and activity was a chance to meet someone new.

Sometimes we would bond over our love for music or sports, while other times we shared stories from our time in college. And as the bootcamp continued, I found the idea of graduate school becoming less intimidating

At UC Davis, I realized it was possible to balance fun and hard work—and be part of a welcoming community.

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Meet the Firms: Networking with 20+ Firms

Finally, it was time to put everything we learned to the test at the annual Meet the Firms event, where recruiters from 24 companies—from boutique firms to the Big Four—gathered in one room to meet us!

Every piece of advice we were given from our network of faculty, alumni and staff, every pitch we practiced in the mirror and every lesson we learned from bootcamp added up to great preparation for the one-on-one interactions at the event. During three hours of networking, our hard work and professional development were paying dividends.

Building My MPAc Community

But the day wasn’t over yet. As exciting as Meet the Firms was, the second half of that day proved even more fun. After the event, my MPAc cohort pulled together a group of new friends and celebrated with pizza and beer at Woodstock’s, a popular hangout in downtown Davis. Beneath the string lights and cool evening air, we talked, laughed and got to know each other better.

In my first week, the MPAc program gave me both a community and a sense that Davis was becoming home.