Professor Elam

Mesquites Find New Outlet

Weekend April 28 2013

Mesquites were not native to Texas. But cattle consumed the mesquite beans and along the trail did what cattle do. The result was that this pesky tree bush is now all over West and South Texas. it sucks most of the sub surface water away from the grasses. And it is near impossible to erradicate. 

Now a Czech company, Green Heart Energy is harvesting mesquites. Green Heart mulches   the branches for shipping purposes. It turns out the mulch produces as an energy level between brown and black coal, with ess pollution. Mesquites will be harvested within 100 miles of Corpus Christi. This keep transportation costs low to ship to Europe out of Port Corpus Christi. 

Green Heart will headquarter in San Antonio, no doubt for the airport. Green Heart plans to be in San Antonio and operating by June of this year. 

The irony is that Green Heart has to pay to harvest the mesquite that the ranchers would otherwise have had to pay to remove themselves. How is that for irony?

Apple - The New Microsoft

Thursday April 25 2013

Microsoft peaked in market cap in 1999. Here is an interesting comparison between Apple and MSFT. Both have lots of cash and market share. But after peaking in 1999 MSFT stock has gone nowhere even with a dividend. This article notes that Apple is liable to repeat the pattern. 

There are many refernces to stock buy backs and dividend payments both of which we have been studying in ACCT 3312, take a read.

Your Own Drone and Camera for $1,000.

Wednesday April 24 2013

Tired of drooling over those Air Force guys flying drones with video all over the world?  Well wait no
longer. THe DJI Phantom Quadcopterwith GO Pro Mount has arrived. Yep just mount the latest wi fi enabled Hero 3 Go Pro underneath the coptor, and with its 300 m range, you will have coverage of your neighborhood.  If I read correctly the Hero Three will transmit to your phone or tablet for continuous feedback during your surveillance. 

I can imagine that a few nieghbors might feel their privacy was invaded, and at this price of course there is no kevlar armor protection. 

This nano technology is getting quite interesting. 

Racquetball Tournament this Weekend in San Antonio

Wednesday April 24 2013

Ruben Medrano sent me this announcement by e mail, he has formed our first Racquetball Club here at Brooks CIty Base. 

The 2013 Battle of the2013 BATTLE AT THE ALAMO - COMBINED LPRT & REGIONAL TOURNAMENT will be held at San Antonio College and three other locations this weekend, actually starts Friday at 6PM and will continue Saturday and Sunday. Part of this event will see some of the best professional women of the Ladies Professional Racquetball Tour (LPRT) as some of the world’s best female players will be there; if you have time, stop by one of the locations and take a look.

I go to watch players and learn, to learn how a tournament is organized and ran, and just to watch all the different people of all ages and lifestyles have fun. You will see what I envision our club to become one day.

 

Have fun, link is below if you need more info.

 

http://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=10768

 

EVENT LOCATION(S)
Thousand Oaks Family YMCA  2263 Thousand Oaks Drive  San Antonio, TX 78232	San Antonio College  1300 San Pedro  San Antonio, TX 78212	LA Fitness - North Star  7140 Blanco Road  San Antonio, TX 78216	Golds Gym - Hill Country Village  15759 San Pedro  San Antonio, Texas 78232

 

 

Click on some of the info tabs to learn more about brackets, prizes, divisions, prizes, etc. They should not charge you to watch, if you go to SAC (where I will be going), ask for Mike Cantu and let him know you are involved with Texas A&M – San Antonio Racquetball Club and drop my name. He will get you in as a guest.

 

I hope that you can go just to check it out. News on our first meeting will go out next week.

 

 

TAMUSA Student Featured at NW Vista Event

Tuesday April  23 2013

Luis Martinez, Student Representative for TSCPA at TAMUSA will be the student featured on this panel next week. '

The Texas Society of CPAs, in conjunction with the San Antonio CPA Society, invites your accounting students to a free workshop focusing on

n  Career opportunities in accounting

n  The future demand for various positions

n  The value of the CPA certificate, and

n  The path to becoming a CPA

 

The program features CPAs in business & industry and public accounting, as well as a current non-traditional student (already a college graduate) who has returned to the classroom to earn a degree in accounting and pursue his CPA certification.

 

As indicated on the attached flyer, this program is next Tuesday, April 30, from 5:15-6:45 p.m. at Northwest Vista College’s Pecan Building, Room 101, 3535 N Ellison Dr, SAT, 78251.

 

Please ask your students to RSVP their attendance to Donna Fritz at [email protected] by tomorrow, April 24^th.

 

 

Amanda Talaat

Assistant Executive Director

San Antonio CPA Society

(210)828-2722

[email protected]

City Council Elections

Tuesday April 23, 2013

Good Morning,

Your class is invited to attend a City Council District 3 Candidate Forum hosted by The Mesquite. The forum is from 6-7:30 p. m. on April 30 in the Large Auditorium at Brooks Campus. District 3 candidates will be on site to answer questions from attendees. Please contact Professor Jenny Moore at (210) 784-1051 for any additional information.

 

Thank you,

 

Joe Camacho

Multimedia Editor

The Mesquite

Texas A&M University-San Antonio

Chief Information Officer Lecture Tomorrow

Posted monday April 22 2013

Tuesday April 23 in Room 168

Robert Burdwell has invited Lawanda Parnell, CIO at Pedernales Electric Coop, to speak on campus tomorrow at 2pm to talk about being a CIO as well as using SAP in the business environment. Please feel free to attend and/or bring your class.

 

Thanks.

Barbara Hewitt, PhD

Assistant Professor Computer Information Systems

Texas A&M University-San Antonio

Texas Tech Establishes School of Accounting

Monday April 22 2013

Texas Tech  will be the first University in Texas to establish a separate School of Accounting. This puts accounting on an equal footing with their law and medical schools. This only makes sense. 

My take is that the smaller schools around the state would be better off to focus on Certified Internal Audit or Certified Management Accounting  at the undergrad level. This would serve their student populations much better. The graduate programs at larger schools that can afford to really staff such grad programs could focus on CPA. 

Survey on Streaming Video and E Mail

Thursday April 18 2013

Dear Faculty,

ITAC (the university’s Information Technology Advisory Council) is looking at several different options for streaming video and student email.  Before we make a decision, we would like student input as to what are the important and needed functionalities.

 

A link to a survey has already been posted on the Blackboard login page but in an attempt to increase the response rate, we are requesting that faculty post the Survey Monkey link (below) in their Blackboard classroom or send an email to their students to complete the short survey. It should take them less than 5 minutes to complete.

 

I appreciate your assistance!

 

The survey can be found at:  https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/63GLWKK

Scott London Fired KPMG Partner

Tuesday April 16 2013

Business Insider reports that  Scott London received a few meals, a $12,000 Rolex, and $25,000 for exchanging information about a client. Now he faces prison. What ws he thinking?

One would think he will lose his CPA license over this, especially if he gets jail time.

ON the other hand redemption extends its hand to the Rogue Trader Nick Leeson.  Leeson brought down Barings Bank, served time, and now is a Financial Advisor in Ireland, go figure.

Would you hire Scott London?