Master of Accounting Science (MAS) student Nick Rozmus has his eyes set on a career in Washington, DC. He wants to take his accounting expertise to agencies tasked with rooting out and stopping financial crime.

While determining his post-graduation plans, he’s thinking about roles in the US Department of Justice and US Department of State. He’s particularly interested in serving the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, part of the US Treasury.

Fighting fraud and financial crime is something Rozmus is passionate about because he wants to help people most vulnerable to their impact.

“I come from a public service family,” said Rozmus, whose great uncle and two grandfathers held careers in military service. He said that growing up, his parents emphasized the value of volunteer work and instilled in him a deep respect and appreciation for helping others.

Rozmus sees accounting as a means of carrying out his passion for service. In his final year of undergraduate studies, he used his business knowledge to help a mobile food pantry as part of a class project. He has also been involved with the Gies Business Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program for two years, helping community members in need file their tax returns.

He said that by applying – and growing – his expertise in accounting standards, taxation, and financial analysis, he believes he can better identify occurrences of financial crimes and help world governments develop more effective measures to prevent them.

Though he’s aware of the obstacles he might face in this arena, Rozmus has never been one to back away from a challenge. This past fall, he applied and interviewed for the highly prestigious Rhodes Scholarship, a postgraduate award that enables young people from around the world to study at the University of Oxford.

In November 2024, Rozmus was named a finalist for the 2025 Rhodes Scholar cohort. Although he ultimately did not receive the scholarship, he walked away from the experience extremely proud to have made it as far as he did.

“Very few of the past winners have come from a business background, and in recent years, few came from public schools,” Rozmus said. Among his region’s cohort, Rozmus was the only finalist with a degree in business.

Though he acknowledged the odds may not have been in his favor, he felt the opportunity was too valuable to let it pass by. “My view is, if you think something’s important, even if you’re probably going to fail, you should just go for it,” he said.

As for the challenges he’ll face throughout the remainder of his career, he believes his time at Gies Business has prepared him to rise to the occasion. Given technological advancement and the transnational nature of most financial crime, he views adaptiveness to new technology and skills in diplomacy as critical to fighting financial crime on a global front.

Rozmus said that building those specific skills was embedded in the accounting curriculum at Gies Business by default.

He also felt that there was room to tailor his accounting degrees even more specifically to his goals. His undergraduate minor in international business enhanced his cross-cultural awareness, and his MAS concentration in information technology control has given him an even deeper understanding of the ways technology can be leveraged for nefarious activities.

Even when the College didn’t offer an opportunity he was interested in directly, its program requirements were adaptive enough so as not to restrict him from pursuing additional credentials.

“I also had a global security certificate, which wasn’t a part of Gies, but I had the flexibility to add it.”

But underlying all the practical knowledge he’s gained is that initial passion for helping others. Rozmus said that the ability to explore and participate in public service during his studies has been invaluable.

He said that many people at Gies Business – professors, teaching assistants, and advisors – went out of their way to help him identify career paths and volunteer opportunities based on his values.

“I really felt like ‘business on purpose’ is real at Gies,” Rozmus said.