A Purpose That Counts – UMHB's Accounting Professors Are Redefining the Numbers Game

DR. VICKY JOHNSON

Dr. Johnson didn’t always plan to be an accountant. She started as a management major at Baylor University until one professor changed everything.

“She had so much energy and so much passion for accounting and her students that I thought, ‘This is what I want to do,’” Johnson recalled. “She wasn’t what you thought of as an accountant. She just broke that stereotype.”

That same spark now fuels Johnson’s own teaching at UMHB. After working in public accounting with PricewaterhouseCoopers and a local firm in Texas, she followed what she calls a divine nudge to teaching – a decision she describes as “truly the Lord.”

“I saw an adjunct position online and thought, I have to call and see,” she said. “It just worked out from there. This is where my calling is. I love it so much! I love the students, the environment and cultivating relationships.”

While Johnson’s classes are filled with real-world stories, laughter and encouragement, her office is stocked with Starburst and Dr Pepper. It’s known as the unofficial hangout spot and a place where students can get help and just relax between classes.

“Sometimes they come in just to talk or cry if they need to,” she said. “I try to make it a peaceful zone where they feel comfortable coming in.”

But beyond snacks, Johnson’s goal is to prepare students for meaningful, people-centered careers.

“I tell them you don’t have to sit behind a desk,” she said. “Form relationships with clients. Be able to speak the language of business. AI can’t replace that human connection.”

She also helps them see accounting as a tool for service and shares how students can use it in all sorts of careers, including nonprofit work and ministry.

“Churches need accountants. Nonprofits need accountants,” she said. “This is such a good base for students who have a heart for ministry.”

That philosophy has inspired the career paths of countless students, including junior Jessie Norvell, who switched majors after taking Johnson’s class.

“I had never been that strong academically,” Norvell said. “But that was the first class I did really well in. Dr. Johnson pulled me aside and said, ‘Have you ever thought about doing accounting?’ She nurtured that. She made me believe I could do it.”

DR. JEROME LOCKETT

Before joining UMHB in 2018, Dr. Lockett spent years in the professional world – from auditing nonprofits to managing global trade show finances in downtown Chicago. But his journey began much earlier, thanks to his older brother.

“He started a business – a laundromat – and needed help closing out the registers,” Lockett said. “I didn’t know anything, but it piqued my interest. I thought, ‘I want to do this!’” So he followed in his brother Jerry’s footsteps and majored in accounting at Indiana University.

With his abundance of accounting experience, he says sharing real-life examples is how his students learn best. “Going to the grocery store, buying milk, paying bills – we make it relatable. That’s how you keep their interest.”

He calls accounting “the language of numbers,” not just math.

“Students are afraid of numbers,” he said. “But I tell them, ‘It’s not math, it’s understanding what the numbers are saying.’”

That understanding, Lockett said, opens doors to countless careers, from corporate finance to ministry work.

“Accounting is very broad,” he said. “You can travel, do audit, work for sports teams, hotels, nonprofits. It’s not just sitting behind a desk in a dark room.”

After two decades working in both secular and faith-based organizations, Lockett sees his move to UMHB as more than a career step. It’s a calling.

Coming to UMHB after building his own business helping churches with their accounting just “felt right,” he said. “The reason I moved from Chicago to here? Students. That’s what got me here.”

For Lockett, that purpose, and the laughter that he and his colleagues share with each other, makes his work at UMHB feel unlike any other place he’s been.

“We’re always in here laughing,” he said. “Other professors walk by and say, ‘You’re accounting; you’re not supposed to have that much fun!’ But that’s what makes it great.”

DR. TIFFANY DELUZE '03

If you ask Dr. DeLuze when she first knew she wanted to teach accounting, she’ll tell you it started with a classroom full of dolls.

“I’d write math problems on sheets of paper, pass them out to all my dolls and then grade them,” she laughed. “At a young age, I knew I wanted to be a teacher, and I needed to teach something to do with numbers.”

That dream took shape years later when she visited her Grandma Russell, a CPA with her own firm in Baltimore.

“She said, ‘Have you ever thought about accounting?’” DeLuze recalled. “She took me to her office, showed me what she did, and I said, ‘I want to be like you.’”

Her grandmother’s influence, coupled with her gift for math, set her on a career path that led through industry, government and nonprofit finance before arriving at UMHB. After earning her MBA at UMHB in 2003, DeLuze joined the faculty, which was an opportunity she credits entirely to God’s timing.

“I didn’t even apply,” she said. “The dean just called me and said there was an opportunity. God saw fit that it was time for me to leave where I was to come here.”

DeLuze’s experience, which includes working at General Dynamics and in nonprofit finance, gives her teaching a real-world edge that students love. But for her, the joy comes from seeing students discover their own purpose.

“I don’t see this as going to work,” she said. “I come here to teach and help students. Seeing them succeed, seeing them come back to campus, hiring new grads; that warms my heart.”

She’s also seen how faith and flexibility make accounting a field full of opportunities.

“There are so many choices in accounting,” she tells her students. “If you don’t like tax, do audit. Don’t like audit? Go corporate or nonprofit. You’re never stuck.”

A COMMUNITY THAT CARES

Beyond lectures and exams, UMHB’s accounting program thrives on forming connections with professors who know students by name, providing open-door mentorship and offering hands-on learning that puts theory into practice.

Dr. Johnson organizes career mixers, field trips and service projects like the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program, where students prepare free tax returns for low-income residents.

“The students get so nervous at first,” she said. “But they come back loving it. It’s a blessing to them and to the people they serve.”

The department also hosts the Accounting Student Association, where students network, serve and sometimes even model in a campus fashion show on “what to wear — and what not to wear — in the workplace.”

And while the coursework is demanding, students say the support makes all the difference.

“They don’t sugarcoat it,” said Jessie. “But they’ll give you every resource to help you succeed. They even spend their lunch hours working with us.”

Senior accounting major Ty Bourland agrees. “The professors here are amazing,” he said. “They’ve helped me learn accounting to its fullest. I truly love accounting, and I believe the accounting professors at UMHB are mostly responsible for that.”