2025 ANCS - Meet the Speakers

On Thursday, Feb. 6, 2025, Great Alaskan Accounting People (GAAP) will host the annual Alaska Native Corporation Seminar! This event will be hosted both online and in-person in the BP Design Theater (401 Engineering Building). Each year, different representatives from Native corporations are invited to network and present. Here are this year's speakers:

Betty M. E. “Liz” Ross holds a Doctor of Business Administration with a concentration in Finance and Management. She is Inupiaq and Jewish; the daughter of Anna Grace Nashoalook Ellis; granddaughter of Joe O. and Ola Nashoalook of Unalakleet, Alaska. Joe O. Nashoalook was the last traditional chief in Unalakleet.   

Liz has spent more than fifty years volunteering in communities, starting as a hospital volunteer in the 60's. In the early 70's she volunteered at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Waco, Texas, and volunteered for the Red Cross in Babenhausen, Germany. During the late 70's she volunteered at the Pensacola YWCA's Project GRO as a mentor for young teens who were placed in juvenile detention and wanted to avoid incarceration. In the 80's Liz volunteered for the 13th Regional Corporation and continued volunteering for various other corporations (mostly non-profit), such as the Elliott Hospital in Manchester, New Hampshire. She serves on the National Board of the American Indigenous Business Leaders organization and locally on the board of the Morris Thompson Cultural Visitors Center. 

Liz teaches as an Adjunct for UAF - College of Business and Security Management and works full-time as the Deputy Director for Tribal Government and Client Services at Tanana Chiefs Conference (TCC). At TCC she helps administer programs to the 42 villages within the TCC region.

Beth Stuart is the Managing Partner of KPMG's Anchorage office. She grew up in Eagle River, graduated from UAA, and joined KPMG right after college. Beth has worked for KPMG for over 30 years in a variety of roles from audit associate to manager to partner, teaching at national training, leading recruiting efforts, and completing a rotation at KPMG's headquarters in New York City. She has spent the majority of her career working with Alaska Native Corporations.

Marissa Wardrop was born in Toronto, Canada. She competed in alpine ski racing both nationally and internationally from a young age.

She earned an athletic scholarship to Montana State University (MSU) in Bozeman, where she competed in NCAA ski racing and completed an undergraduate degree in Finance. Marissa also obtained a Masters in Professional Accountancy at MSU.

Her career started as an auditor at KPMG, where she was promoted to Audit Manager and worked for five and a half years. Currently, Marissa is the Corporate Controller at Arctic Slope Regional

Corporation (ASRC) and has been with ASRC for three years. She is a CPA and enjoys her career in accounting.

Marissa has a two-year-old daughter who she is teaching to downhill ski this season and is expecting her second child at the end of March.