PhD. Students in Residence

Profile picture of Nico Arguello

Nico Arguello

Third year

Fields of interest: Internal Audit, External Audit, Corporate Governance

Nico Arguello earned his Bachelor of Business Administration in accounting as well as a master’s degree in accounting (with a double concentration in audit/advisory and tax) from Southern Methodist University in 2014 and 2016, respectively. His professional career includes work as an internal auditor at Trinity Industries. Additionally, he worked as a manager for EY (Dallas) across several lines of service, ranging from assurance and internal audit to accounting compliance and reporting (ACR). Immediately prior to joining UT’s Ph.D. program, he worked as an internal audit manager at Protiviti (Dallas). He is a certified public accountant in the state of Texas and a certified internal auditor. He is also a member of The Ph.D. Project (KPMG Foundation), the president-elect of the Accounting Doctoral Student Association (ADSA), a recipient of the AICPA Fellowship for Minority Doctoral Students and a Hispanic Scholarship Fund scholar.

Email: jarguell@vols.utk.edu

Download CV

Profile picture of Jack Badger

Jack Badger

Fourth year

Fields of interest: Tax, Disclosure, Financial Reporting

Jack Badger’s dissertation, “Who Benefits From Detailed Income Tax Footnotes,” investigates how the level of income tax detail disclosed by a firm impacts various market participants. Badger’s other research projects include "Sales Tax Collection and Income Tax Aggressiveness" with James Chyz, William Fox and LeAnn Luna, "The Determinants and Consequences of Firms' Decisions to Implement COVID-19 Vaccination Mandates" with Justin Short and “Investor Response to Net Operating Loss Carryback Provisions” with James Chyz. He is also an Accounting Doctoral Scholars (ADS) Program Scholar. He earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Mississippi in 2016, and he is a licensed CPA in the state of North Carolina. Prior to entering the Ph.D. program, he worked as a valuation consultant at DHG and as a tax associate at PwC. He has taught Managerial Accounting and Federal Income Taxation at UT. He anticipates completing his Ph.D. requirements by May 2024.

Email: jbadger1@vols.utk.edu

Download CV

Profile picture of Deanie Choudoin

Deanie Choudoin

First year

Fields of interest: Audit, Corporate Governance, Financial Reporting

Deanie Choudoin earned her Bachelor of Business Administration in accounting and Master of Accountancy from Lipscomb University in 2020 and 2021, respectively. Prior to starting the Ph.D. program, she worked as an assurance associate at EY in Nashville. She has teaching experience as an adjunct instructor of Financial Accounting at Lipscomb University. She is a licensed CPA in the state of Tennessee. 

Email: dchaudoi@vols.utk.edu

Download CV

Profile picture of Audree Duncan

Audree Duncan

Second year

Fields of interest: Audit, Forensic Accounting

Audree Duncan earned her Bachelor of Business Administration in Accounting (2021) and Master of Accountancy (2022) from the University of Tennessee. After completing her undergraduate degree, she completed an internship in external assurance at PwC in Nashville. She is a member of the Tennessee Doctoral Scholars Cohort, the American Accounting Association and the Ph.D. Project Accounting Doctoral Student Association (ASDA). She currently serves as the social media manager for the ASDA.

Email: adunca34@vols.utk.edu

Download CV

Profile picture of Travis Foshag

Travis Foshag

Third year

Fields of interest: Financial Reporting, Disclosure, Corporate Governance

Travis Foshag’s current research examines industry grouping schema and firm participation in the voluntary carbon offset market. He earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in accounting from the University of Wyoming and the University of Montana, respectively. Prior to entering the Ph.D. program, he worked at Deloitte and at a Montana-based accounting firm as an auditor, at a nonprofit financial institution as an accounting and compliance manager and at a startup software company as the lead accountant. He taught introductory and intermediate financial reporting courses to undergraduate students and an advanced financial topics course to graduate students at the University of Montana. He also taught intermediate financial reporting to undergraduate students while at UT. He is a licensed CPA in Colorado and Montana.

Email: tfoshag@vols.utk.edu

Download CV

Profile picture of Kory Maag

Kory Maag

Fourth year

Fields of interest: Corporate governance, Compensation, Financial Reporting

Kory Maag earned his Bachelor of Business Administration in accounting as well as a master’s degree in financial management from Texas A&M University in 2020. While at Texas A&M, he completed internships in internal audit and store operations at Academy Sports + Outdoors in Katy, Texas, as well as an assurance internship at EY in Charlotte, NC. In addition, he taught an entry-level business class to first-year students in 2016, 2017 and 2019. While at UT, he taught Intermediate Financial Accounting II. His dissertation is preliminarily titled "Spring-Loaded Equity Awards: An Examination of the Incentives and Consequences." His other research projects include "Shareholder Proposal Pressure and Governance Disclosures" with Lauren Cunningham and Roy Schmardebeck and "Obfuscating the Source of Director Nominations" with Cory Cassell, Linda Myers and Roy Schmardebeck. He expects to complete the requirements of the Ph.D. program by May 2024. 

Email: kmaag@vols.utk.edu

Download CV

Profile picture of Adrien Roberto

Adrien Roberto

First year

Fields of interest: Internal Audit, External Audit, Financial Reporting, Corporate Governance

Adrien Roberto earned her Bachelor of Business Administration in accounting and management information systems, as well as her master’s degree in accounting with a business analytics certificate, from Ohio University in 2018 and 2023, respectively. Her professional career includes work in both external and internal audit. Following her undergraduate studies, she worked at PwC in their assurance practice in their Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio offices. Prior to joining UT’s Ph.D. program, she worked as a senior internal auditor at Vertiv (Columbus, Ohio). She is a certified public accountant in the state of Ohio. 

Email: arobe137@vols.utk.edu

Download CV

Profile picture of Eric Stakebake

Eric Stakebake

Second year

Fields of interest: Corporate Governance, Financial Reporting

Eric Stakebake earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in accounting from Brigham Young University in 2020. While at BYU, he taught an introduction to accounting course for undergraduate students. Prior to entering the Ph.D. program, he worked for several years as a treasury analyst at Ancestry, where he performed global cash forecasting and reporting. He is leveraging this experience in his current research, which examines the impact of treasurers on corporate cash outcomes.

Email: estakeba@vols.utk.edu

Download CV