Lauren (Dreher) Cunningham joined UT’s Department of Accounting and Information Management after receiving her Ph.D. in accounting from the University of Arkansas. Lauren serves as the Director of Research for the C. Warren Neel Corporate Governance Center and the coordinator of the Neel CGC Distinguished Speaker Series, which hosts corporate executives, board members, regulators, and other industry leaders. She also serves on the editorial and review boards for Contemporary Accounting Research, Auditing: A Journal of Practice and Theory, and Accounting Horizons. Her research interests include audit, corporate governance, and the SEC filing review process (comment letters). Lauren’s research has been published in The Accounting Review, Contemporary Accounting Research, Review of Accounting Studies, and Accounting Horizons and presented at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s Division of Economic and Risk Analysis as well as conferences internationally. Her research has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, CFO.com, Accounting Today and in Agenda, the Financial Times’ corporate governance service.

Lauren serves as the audit curriculum coordinator and has taught auditing to both undergraduate and graduate students. She has also taught a PhD seminar on current topics in auditing and corporate governance. Her teaching cases are published in Issues in Accounting Education and Current Issues in Auditing. Her innovative data visualization audit case is the recipient of the Best Paper Award in Issues in Accounting Education and the AAA Innovation in Auditing and Assurance Education Award. Prior to obtaining her Ph.D., Lauren worked as an audit manager with Grant Thornton, LLP in Dallas, specializing in the real estate and technology industries. She earned her undergraduate degree in accounting from Drury University in Springfield, Missouri, and is a licensed Certified Public Accountant in Texas.