Dr Helen Foster

Overview

Helen is a senior lecturer in accounting at Ulster University, where she teaches a range of accounting subjects focusing in particular on financial accounting and IFRS. She is also Course Director for BSc (Hons) Accounting and is active in promoting employability skills among students.

Helen trained in Dublin as a Chartered Accountant before moving to Belfast. She worked in number of financial accounting roles in practice and in industry before taking up her role at Ulster in 2002. Helen holds a BA (Hons.) Accounting, First Class, from Ulster, an MPA with distinction, and a PhD also from Ulster.

Helen is a fellow of Chartered Accountants Ireland, and a member of CAI Ulster Society Public Sector Group, and has held a number of positions in examining for professional accounting bodies. She is also a judge of the Published Accounts Award, sponsored by the Irish Stock Exchange.

In addition to her interest in financial accounting Helen is interested in issues concerning accountability in the public sector and has a research interest in Public Accounts Committees, particularly under devolution in the UK. The title of her PhD, awarded in 2020,  is A Study of the Devolved Public Accounts Committees of the UK. She has presented her work to a range of audiences, and advised government.

Helen is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and was a team member awarded a Distinguished Teaching Award in 2014.