Member Moment: From Opera to Accounting with Laura Wardwell, CPA
January 13, 2026
Laura Wardwell, CPA, a doctoral student and OSCPA member, shared insights about her journey from music to accounting, including her experience in auditing and banking, and her passion for teaching and research.
Get to know her a little better. Her experience might surprise (and inspire) you.
From Opera to Accounting
Laura’s path to accounting is anything but traditional. She began with a Bachelor of Music degree from Loyola University of New Orleans and later pursued a Master of Opera Performance at Oklahoma City University. When a performance career no longer felt right, she explored a new direction and found accounting through Oklahoma City University's (OCU) Meinders School of Business.
After graduating, Laura worked as a financial institution auditor at BKD, LLP, and later spent ten years as controller for Valliance Bank. Even then, she couldn’t stay away from the classroom, teaching adjunct courses throughout her time in industry. After having her daughter, she decided to pursue a PhD and follow what had always inspired her most: learning, teaching, and being in the classroom full-time.
A Day in Her Life
Laura is currently a doctoral student at the University of Oklahoma, where she assists faculty with teaching and research. She's also taking her own classes and learning how to conduct research in the accounting field—everything from working with large historical datasets to designing psychological experiments that address common accounting issues.
A typical day involves grading assignments, reading research and taking notes, coding her own projects, or meeting with students. After the spring 2026 semester, she'll take a comprehensive exam over everything she has learned in the last two years, and then will proceed to work on her dissertation.
Why She Became a CPA
Laura believes accounting is about accountability, something she sees as essential to how society functions. Being entrusted by the State of Oklahoma to uphold those standards for the public is a responsibility she takes seriously and finds deeply rewarding.
Her Advice When Taking the CPA Exam
Laura prefers to have a lot of structure to accomplish a big task like the CPA Exam. If you're the same way, there are so many great courses out there that have already built that structure, and she highly recommends using one.
If you struggle with motivation, break the course into small pieces. Laura suggests setting a timer for 30 minutes instead of an hour, and those 30 minutes a day will add up as long as you stay consistent. She also advises you not to cram, and instead take small steps at a steady pace rather than trying to sprint through material the day before.
How Being Involved Impacted Her Career
Laura says the OSCPA is an “incredible resource” for both students and professionals.
An OSCPA scholarship helped her complete her master’s degree, and as a professional, she has relied on the society’s conferences and networking events to stay up to date and connected with colleagues. She encourages others to take advantage of the opportunities the state CPA society offers now.
As she put it, “it’s incredibly rewarding to give back later.”
Her Dream Dinner Guest
If you could pick anyone to have dinner with, who would it be? For Laura, that's Kurt Vonnegut. She first encountered his work while on a quest to read through as much of the Banned Books List as she could, and it stuck with her ever since.
She believes everyone should read at least one of his books, and always remember that “we are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful what we pretend to be.”