Gloribert Roque-Melendez had one clear career goal: make partner at EY, one of the Big Four accounting firms.

She was working toward it when she lost her younger sister, Sheiley, in an accident in 2015. “My heart was no longer there,” Roque-Melendez said.

Four years later, after 13 years with the firm, she left EY. A senior manager in her fifth year, she was building her case for promotion and had been told she was on track to be considered for executive director within the next two years. Instead, she walked away.

In 2019, Roque-Melendez and her husband moved to Las Vegas, where she planned to retire early, take road trips, and visit national parks. Instead, the move led her to UNLV, where she is a lecturer in the Lee Business School’s accounting department.

Finding Her Way to UNLV

In 2022, Roque-Melendez was invited to guest lecture in now-retired professor Paulette Tandy’s Internal Audit course and in the Accounting Information Systems course taught by the late Patricia Navarro-Velez. She drew on her own experience supporting external audits and internal audit initiatives for advisory clients.

“I cherished both opportunities for giving me the chance to interact with the students and presenting me with this new academic path as a possibility,” she said. “A possibility converted into an amazing reality.”

When a full-time lecturer position opened, she applied.

The Unexpected Second Career 

Roque-Melendez officially joined UNLV in 2022, and one of her first assignments was developing Accounting Data Analytics, a course that is now a core requirement for accounting majors. Students complete labs using tools including Excel, Power Query, Power BI, and Alteryx to analyze accounting data. 

“I bring professionals as guest speakers who can demonstrate that the coursework I offer them is relevant,” Roque-Melendez said.

Robyn Raschke, a professor of accounting, said one question consistently guides Roque-Melendez’s work: “What is the best experience for students?”

Some of those great experiences don’t happen in the classroom. “Every time a student comes to me excited about getting their first internship offer is special,” Roque-Melendez said.

At events like Beta Alpha Psi (BAP) Employers' Night, she also sees former students return to campus as professionals, this time meeting and recruiting students themselves.

Beyond the classroom, Roque-Melendez advises UNLV’s ALPFA student chapter and the university’s ISACA Student Group. During her four years as an ALPFA faculty co-adviser, the UNLV chapter has grown from fewer than 20 members to more than 150 active students.

Ikseon Suh, a professor of accounting, has seen her become a central part of the department.

“It is difficult to imagine our Accounting Department without Glori,” Suh said. “Her contributions have become an integral part of who we are as a department and a community.”

Home Means Puerto Rico

Roque-Melendez grew up in Cidra, a mountain town in Puerto Rico known as La Ciudad de la Eterna Primavera, or the City of Eternal Spring. Her father worked as an operator for PepsiCo, and her mother, a teacher, spent much of Roque-Melendez’s childhood at home raising the family.

She remembers her grandmother as the kind of person who was always taking care of someone. When she visited friends and relatives, she “never went anywhere empty-handed,” always finding something to bring or some way to help.

On her father’s side alone, Roque-Melendez grew up with roughly 40 cousins, many of whom felt more like siblings.

In the corporate world, though, she sometimes felt pressure to fit in. She remembers taking golf lessons so she could join a client outing. She also straightened her naturally curly hair because she thought it looked more professional.

Today, she wears her natural curls. “I am a proud Latina, and I let my curls show it,” she said. “I want to help students feel comfortable with their genuine selves and feel represented when they see me.”

Every semester, Roque-Melendez shares a note with her students encouraging them to be kind, respectful, genuine, and present. She also urges them to be intentional about making time for the people and things they love, even if that means blocking the time on their calendars.

“It will be easy to just lose track of time being so involved in the day-to-day,” she said. “Time is more valuable than money.”