Rate My Professor Suzanne Owens-Ott

G. Suzanne Owens-Ott, DBA, CPA, is Professor of Accounting and Academic Head of the Davis School of Business at Colorado Mesa University, a position she has held since August 2006. A first-generation college student and the first in her family to attend graduate school, she earned her Doctor of Business Administration from California Southern University in July 2019, with a dissertation titled “CPAs and the Marijuana Industry: A Qualitative Analysis of Colorado and Washington.” Additional degrees include a Master of Science in Business Education from Emporia State University in May 2006, a Master of Business Administration from the University of Missouri-Kansas City in May 1998, and a Bachelor of Science in Accounting from Norfolk State University in May 1993. Before joining Colorado Mesa University, she served as an Instructor of Accounting and Business at Kansas City Kansas Community College from August 2003 to July 2006, teaching 15-21 credit hours per semester and serving on accreditation committees. Owens-Ott possesses extensive professional experience, including Audit Senior at Deloitte & Touche LLP in Kansas City, Missouri, from August 1993 to November 1995, where she planned and performed audit engagements across industries, and Program Manager III in Enterprise Accounting Services at Sprint Corporation from November 1995 to August 2003, managing financial compliance, entity integrations, and accounting teams.

At Colorado Mesa University, Owens-Ott teaches Principles of Financial Accounting, Principles of Managerial Accounting, Ethics for Accounting Professionals, Professional Preparation, Data Analytics for Accounting and Audit I and II, and the core MBA accounting course. Her scholarship focuses on accounting pedagogy, ethics, and cannabis industry issues, with publications such as “Accounting and the US cannabis industry: federal financial reporting issues” in the Journal of Cannabis Research (2020), “Ethical perspectives of certified public accountants and the legalization of cannabis” (2022), “The determination of faculty members’ perceptions and knowledge of the teacher-scholar model at a primarily teaching institution” in International Research in Education (2019), “Inverting the Principles of Accounting Classroom” in Proceedings of the Mountain Plains Business Conference (2014), and “Experiential learning for accounting students” in the International Journal of Learning (2010). She has earned multiple CMU Exemplary Faculty Ratings from 2007 to 2018 and the Grand Junction Chapter of Commerce Outstanding Educator award in 2008. As a licensed Certified Public Accountant, she chairs the Colorado Board of Accountancy, appointed by Governor Polis, and previously served as CMU Faculty Trustee, COCPA Educational Foundation Board member, and Grand Junction Airport Audit and Finance Committee member. Her service includes chairing the CMU Assessment Committee (2011-2018) and co-chairing the Davis School of Business AACSB accreditation committee.