The American Institute of CPAs has named Belverd (Bel) Needles as the 2021 recipient of its AICPA Gold Medal Award of Distinction.
The highest honor granted by the AICPA, the Gold Medal Award, since its inception in 1944, has recognized CPAs who have notable influence on the accounting profession. Jack Finning, chair of the AICPA Awards Committee, presented Needles with the award during the virtual fall meeting of the AICPA’s governing Council.
“Bel has had a tremendous impact on the profession that spanned the length of his impressive career,” Finning said in a statement. “His work as an educator and volunteer with the AICPA and the Illinois CPA Society has positively influenced countless students on their journey towards earning their CPA license and entering the profession.”
Needles has spent more than 40 years at DePaul University in Chicago as one of the founding directors of the School of Accountancy and as an EY Distinguished Professor of Accountancy. Needles played a key role in the addition of management information systems to the school’s accountancy curriculum and also developed the first combined 150-hour undergraduate and graduate program in Illinois in response to the new CPA requirement.
From 1994-1996, Needles served as the chair of the AICPA’s Accounting Education Executive Committee. He is also a long-standing member of the Illinois CPA Society, a founding member of the CPA Endowment Fund of Illinois, and is responsible for the Needles, Snow, Wish Accounting Scholarship Fund, which provides more than 20 tuition scholarships per year.
Needles previously received the AICPA’s Distinguished Achievement in Accounting Education Award, the ICPAS’s Lifetime Achievement Award and Outstanding Educator Award, and the Via Sapientiae Award — the highest award for service to DePaul University — upon his retirement.
For a list of previous Gold Medal Award recipients, head to the AICPA’s
