This story was originally published on the Department of Accounting's Centennial Celebration website, where you can share your own memories of your time in the program, favorite professors and classmate stories or test your trivia knowledge, view historical photos and buy gear to show your Centennial pride.

By Sean Gaven, BBA, MPA '96

With a bit of time now passed between me and my campus days, I recently had the opportunity to reflect back on my time as a student. What did I enjoy the most, what did the University teach me which has proven to be the most valuable.

The occasion for the reflection was driving around Austin and the UT Campus with my five year old as he prepares for entering kindergarten – or in his words “the big kids school.”  A quick family trip back to Austin, always nice and enjoyable.

A bit vague, a bit scary, with more than a few unknowns, but reflecting back it struck me that what UT taught me the most was not financial statement analysis, Chem 101, or even how to navigate 6th street after a UT win, but how to handle transitions.

Transitions between high school and university life, transitions between living at home and living with others, and transitions from college life to “real life.” That was most valuable lesson, and one that I’ve time and again since leaving campus.

So as we drove around looking at dad’s “big school,” where he lived at Jester and of course all the renovated and new buildings from the last two decades, those transitions did seem to be the valued learning and whether it was from high school to university, university to “real life” or even the transition to the “big kids school” of kindergarten, handling those transitions are at times fun, scary and certainly memorable.

Thanks UT.