Sharon Kurek

Sharon M. Kurek, CPA, CFE, CCEP, MBA

Vice President for Audit, Risk, and Compliance and Chief Risk Officer, Virginia Tech

Sharon is the Vice President for Audit, Risk, and Compliance and Chief Risk Officer at Virginia Tech.  Sharon supports Virginia Tech's vision of an integrated view of risk and leveraging what it can bring to strategic decision-making across the university.  In her role, Sharon has institutional responsibility for facilitating the university’s enterprise risk management (ERM) program, coordinating the institutional compliance programs (ICP), and overseeing internal audit.  Sharon reports to the Compliance, Audit, and Risk Committee of the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors with dual administrative reporting to the University President and Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer.

Sharon is an experienced leader with proven ability to promote a culture of accountability and ethical decision-making, facilitate identification and mitigation of risks to an acceptable level, and foster continuous improvement in the areas of risk management, internal control, efficiency, policy, and procedure.  She strives to be a collaborative leader with an expectation of excellence and is dedicated to advancing the risk management, compliance, and auditing professions.

Prior to joining Virginia Tech in 2008, Sharon worked at the University of California, Berkeley, serving in a number of roles with increasing responsibility in the audit and risk management functions.  She began her professional career at the Georgia Department of Audits conducting external audits of state entities, including colleges and universities for the State of Georgia.  She received her MBA from Virginia Tech, a bachelor’s degree from Mercer University, and holds professional certifications in public accountancy, compliance and ethics, and fraud.

Sharon is a member of various risk, compliance, auditing, accounting, and higher education organizations serving as a presenter, in various committee and leadership roles, and as a contributing author.  Sharon served as President of the Association of College & University Auditors (ACUA), an international association of 600 higher education institutions from the United States, Canada, and abroad, and is a recipient of ACUA’s Member Service Award recognizing her contributions to association and its membership.

Contact Sharon:

kurek@vt.edu
540-231-5883