"I've been interested in Andersen as a company for quite awhile," she said. "They really just seem to be a company that provided a lot of opportunity and a lot of growth, and definitely a good career experience."

Roney accepted an offer last fall from the embattled accounting firm, but learned last week that that offer had been rescinded, leaving her without a job long after the rest of the "Big Five" accounting firms finished recruiting.

She's not alone. Andersen's troubles have caused the company to revoke job offers to other soon-to-be graduates of ASU's College of Business and upcoming graduates at other schools. "We have rescinded 52 offers locally here in our Phoenix office alone, and about 250 throughout the market circle (Arizona, Nevada, Southern California, New Mexico and Hawaii)," said Tammie Blum, Andersen's director of recruiting. "It's a direct reflection of the Justice Department indictment. We would not have gone through this otherwise. What happens is you start losing a lot of your public clients."

Salt River Project and Action Performance Companies, which makes and markets NASCAR products, are among Arizona public companies that have dropped Andersen as auditor, while Allied Waste, the Scottsdale-based private trash hauler, has notified the Securities and Exchange Commission that it is considering replacing Andersen as its auditor. Global electronics distributor Avnet, based in Phoenix, and Tempe-based Three-Five Systems, which makes lighting for high-tech gear, have not indicated any plans to drop the firm.

In addition to rescinding job offers, Andersen is unlikely to continue providing thousands of dollars in scholarship money, as well as funding for school programs, Blum said. Andersen's last annual fund drive raised $38,000 for ASU, which went toward scholarships and program enhancement, Blum said.

Also, Andersen won't be purchasing "$1,000 tables" at functions that support the College of Business, she said.

"That's a lot of money for them not to get in the future," Blum said.

Roney had a feeling things might change because of Andersen's worsening situation.

"My reaction was mixed because I guess with everything that was happening, it wasn't too much of a shock, although the reality was a little more upsetting than the potential," she said. "I've made this investment in my education, taking a year off of work to make a career change, and was expecting to have a job coming out of it."

Just three weeks ago, Roney had been encouraged by Andersen that the "possibilities for coming out of this were still quite strong" and that her job was not in jeopardy.

"But events just turned so quickly and the Department of Justice has really just been pretty pursuant," she said. "So I guess it did come as a shock from that standpoint because so recently I had been encouraged by the firm. But yet, I don't have any hard feelings toward Andersen at all."

While students like Roney have seen their job offers rescinded, Andersen is in the process of laying off 7,000 of its current employees, making it that much harder for these graduates to find other jobs. Andersen won't say how many people in its Phoenix-area office, at 44th and Washington streets, will lose their jobs. The Valley office had about 500 employees as of earlier this month.

Andersen is one of the largest, if not the largest recruiter of ASU accounting graduates because its Valley office is the largest of all the "Big Five" firms doing business locally, said Philip Reckers, director of the School of Accountancy and Information Management.

"The market was really bad for jobs before this," he said. "Now if you factor into this thing that not only is a major player not hiring, but they are putting more people into the market because they're laying off seasoned, trained accountants, that is going to exacerbate the problem for new students. It's a very difficult employment market."

Many accounting firms resisted laying off people during the recession, and as a result have extra people already on staff to take on new clients lost by Andersen, Reckers said.

Many of those students who accepted offers from Andersen knew those positions were in jeopardy "but they felt obligated to Andersen because they had accepted the offer," said Douglas Johnson, professor of accountancy and information management.

"At least now they're free to get out and look for other employment," he said. "They know what their situation is a little clearer. Obviously a lot of innocent people, very good people got hurt in this whole process. And a lot of them work for Andersen."

It's going to take at least a few months for firms that have gained clients from Andersen to determine how many additional employees they will need, said Michael O'Dell, associate professor of accountancy and information management.

"So hopefully a lot of my students will get jobs, but it's not going to be immediate, it's going to take a little while," he said. "Most of them want to stay here in Phoenix, though some are willing to go elsewhere."

Even if Andersen goes under, their business will go somewhere else, "so the number of jobs won't go down," Reckers said.

"The number of jobs will simply rest in different hands," he said.

In the meantime, Roney remains optimistic that she'll be able to find another job and begin her new career.

"I think there will definitely be an opportunity that presents itself here locally," she said. "It's just a question of how long that will take for all of that to settle. I've learned so much, but school is always theoretical as compared to the real world. I'm anxious to see how it all works once you actually get into the industry."