New Faculty Profiles

Steven Opurt

Assistant professor of accounting, Graziadio School

Steven Opurt began his career in the mid-1980s as a Certified Public Accountant in San Antonio, Texas, before working as the vice president and portfolio manager at Franklin Asset Management Systems in San Mateo, California.

He earned his bachelor's degree in accounting at Indiana University, and followed it with a master of business administration and PhD in business from the University of Chicago's Graduate School of Business. Before moving into full-time academia professionally, he worked for UNext.com, a provider of online MBA level courses, where he developed the firm's MBA program in financial accounting.

Opurt has taught at universities across America, and across the world in Singapore. He looks forward to the small class sizes at Pepperdine. "This allows me to work closer with my students and I can respond better to individual questions," he says.

We ask: If you could give just one piece of business/financial advice to a person starting out at college, what would it be?
I'd suggest two items. 1: Learn a second (or third) language. And 2: Travel to new countries and engage in the new country's culture.