Pathway to 150 hours enters year 2 with positive reviews

Chad Acord is a 41-year-old father of four who’s been in the accounting profession for more than a decade. Now, after years of waiting, he’s about to close the 13-college-credit-hour gap that’s been keeping him from earning his CPA license.

Acord was one of the first participants in the AICPA’s and National Association of State Boards of Accountancy’s (NASBA’s) Experience, Learn and Earn (ELE) program, which launched as a pilot in early 2024 and continues in 2025. The program offers online courses through a Tulane University professional education program at a reduced tuition rate to help accountants reach the CPA requirement of 150 hours of college education, about 30 more than a four-year college degree.

“It will definitely be a big weight off my shoulders, finally being able to advance to my next chapter,” he said.

The ELE program is part of a broader effort to unclog the accounting profession’s talent pipeline — creating more accessible and inexpensive ways to get the education and certifications for a career as a CPA.

Other ways to reach the 150-hour requirement are taking additional classes or adding a master’s degree, both costly and time-intensive options, especially for someone like Acord, who completed his undergraduate accounting degree in his late 30s while raising children.

“I didn’t want to get my master’s, I didn’t want to go into debt,” he said of the challenge posed by the credit-hour requirement.

On Feb. 14, the AICPA and NASBA proposed changes to the Uniform Accountancy Act (UAA) that would allow individuals to earn their CPA license with a bachelor’s degree, two years of professional experience, and passage of the CPA Exam. The announcement came a month after Ohio enacted a law adding a pathway to CPA qualification with two years of experience and a bachelor’s degree. The Virginia House and Senate unanimously passed legislation earlier this month to add a third pathway, which still must be signed by Gov. Glenn Youngkin.

Several other states are also considering legislation that would provide alternative pathways to CPA licensure.

ELE is one segment of a path to licensure designed to address the time and cost of education. Participants and employers gave the program high marks in its first year, saying it had proved a valuable new option.

Opening the pipeline

Acord worked as a bartender throughout his 20s, never completing college. By age 30, he wanted a change and got it when his stepfather took him into his small firm, teaching him taxes and more.

“I had to get out of the bar business because it was killing me,” Acord said.

Since then, Acord completed an undergraduate degree in accounting and earned a job as senior accountant I at Jones & Roth CPAs and Business Advisors in Eugene, Ore.

He looked into a few local community colleges to earn the 13 credit hours he needed to meet the 150-hour requirement for the CPA Exam — without success.

“I didn’t really feel like I wanted to do an associate’s [two-year] degree for 13 credits,” Acord said.

The ELE offered easy access to online classes from Tulane at a cost that beat the local community college. For Acord, it was about 25% cheaper than a local option and much less hassle. Acord did not want to enroll in a degree program just to get a handful of credits, worrying that unenrolling could be an inconvenience. ELE allows students to take the number of credits they need.

Other ELE participants said they’ve saved thousands of dollars. The tuition for ELE credits is $150 per hour, well below the national average of $477 for the college cost per credit hour reported last year by BestColleges. The lower cost was a major motivation for Katelynn Brown and several other early-career accountants at Faw Casson CPA, a firm in Dover, Del.

“Overall, the credits were extremely affordable and allow for flexibility to take the courses after normal working hours. I normally did my schoolwork at night when I was off from my day job,” Brown said.

Tulane’s course recommendations include business and leadership, expository writing, information technology, public speaking, and media. ELE program participants generally praised the selection and quality of courses, but some suggested the university curate more recommended courses for accountants.

ELE students don’t obtain a degree as part of the program, but the credits are transferable if an ELE student would like to pursue a second degree somewhere else.

Brown and Acord were among 182 students who enrolled in the ELE program in its first four semesters, representing 100 firms.

The ELE program is largely unchanged for 2025, with one significant exception. The program no longer requires students to have an employer sponsor. ELE officials made the change after hearing from a significant number of potential students who wanted to participate but whose employer, usually not an accounting firm, did not. The program continues to require that the participant be employed.

Employers are investing

Sue Langley, CPA, has embraced the program for Coles Reinstein, the small firm where she is a partner. The arrival of larger firms in booming Boise, Idaho, has increased the competition for accountants coming out of colleges and universities. Succession planning is a worry.

“I eventually want to retire, my partner wants to retire,” Langley said.

One promising recent hire had been working in the private sector for a few years and hadn’t previously planned to become a CPA. He was 30 credit hours short of the CPA requirement.

“He had the motivation but would be so far away from actually becoming a CPA. He knew that he needed another 10 classes,” Langley said. He and the firm have embraced the ELE program as an inexpensive and convenient alternative.

She hopes that the program will be one step in developing the future leaders of the firm. “We are really seeing this as a partnership,” she said.

Linda Pietras similarly sees ELE as an avenue for retention at Gross Mendelsohn, a Maryland-based firm of more than 150 people.

“This, in essence, also becomes a retention tool for the firm, as our staff appreciate the support of covering the cost of the classes and providing them time to complete their classwork and attain the necessary credits,” said Pietras, the firm’s managing director of human resources.

That offer is also attractive to new hires and interns, giving Gross Mendelsohn a recruiting edge. Firms may choose whether and how much money to pay toward employees’ program costs.

James Hall, CPA, managing partner at Hall CPA Group in Kings Park, N.Y., said his firm’s participation in the program was also a significant factor in attracting a recent hire. The new hire wanted to become a CPA after working as an administrative assistant.

“[W]hile there is an abundance of opportunities with small firms, not enough candidates are giving them a look. Participating in the ELE program levels the playing field for these smaller firms, allowing them to utilize the program to recruit talent and offer an unobstructed path to partnership to help solve their succession challenges,” he said.

But he was concerned, Hall added, that the second year of the program will not require employer sponsorship. He worried the change will undermine the recruiting advantage the program provides to small firms.

‘An answer to a prayer’

For Gary Hamilton, CPA, a sole practitioner in Gretna, La., the ELE program has been “a godsend … The program, it was an answer to a prayer.”

Hamilton, now 70, started his firm a decade ago after a career in industry, and the firm now has five employees. He’s supporting two employees as they get the 30 hours each needs to meet the 150-hour requirement — one through a master’s, the other through the ELE program.

“I just love working with individuals who want to learn and want to advance themselves,” he said. “Just to be totally transparent, my personal plan right now is to work five more years and call it quits.”

He wants someone to replace him, and he’s hopeful that investing in his employees will help that happen.

“For me, it’s so worth it, both as a practitioner and as a desire to promote education,” Hamilton said.

— Andrew Kenney is a freelance writer based in Colorado. To comment on this article or to suggest an idea for another article, contact Jeff Drew at Jeff.Drew@aicpa-cima.com.