Point Park University's Accounting Students Attend 'ENRON' Performance Wednesday, November 19, 2025
Accounting faculty and students at Point Park University attended a performance of "Enron" by Lucy Prebble on Nov. 14, seeing how the scandal around the company's bankruptcy played out in a unique way.
"A lot of the accounting terminology that we use in class helped me understand the context around the parts of the play, especially when it got more specific in terms of stocks and debts."
Students from Point Park University's accounting program attended a unique learning experience in Downtown Pittsburgh.
Professors Jayne Olshanski and Amy Cesario organized a trip to Oxford Center for a Quantum Theatre production of Lucy Prebble's "Enron" on Nov. 14. During this presentation of the show, students were able to listen in to an expert discussion before the performance that focused on the big financial ideas presented throughout the play.
"Enron is one of the most infamous financial fraud cases in our country's history," said Jayne Olshanski, associate professor of accounting. "I am glad that our students had this opportunity to learn up close about the corporate culture that enabled the fraud and the persistence of ethically-minded people to uncover it."
The show focused on the Enron scandal, which first dominated headlines in October 2001. At the time, Enron had filed for bankruptcy as widespread internal fraud was discovered within the American energy company. Throughout the show, this financial corruption was shown in a variety of unique ways.
"A moment that stood out to me in the show was when there were raptors on stage," said Sam Alawadhi, a junior accounting and computer science double major. "The raptors were being fed dollar bills by the CFO of Enron during the show, acting as a metaphor for the special purpose entities that Enron used to cover up their debts. I thought it was a creative way to convey that aspect of the scandal."
While there was vivid symbolism for some of these complex concepts, the accounting students were also catching many of the core concepts that they are learning each day on campus. Enron is a topic many of these students learn about as they study the financial industry, so they were able to catch some of the the misapplication of accounting standards that were used at Enron throughout performance.
"A lot of the accounting terminology that we use in class helped me understand the context around the parts of the play, especially when it got more specific in terms of stocks and debts," Alawadhi said.