School of Accountancy and Taxation

• Certificate (Not Applicable)

   

• Associate Degree (Not Applicable)

   

• Bachelor Degree

  At the end of their study in either Accounting (BS) or Finance (BS), students will

  • Understand the professional role played by accountants in society.
  • Effectively utilize the accounting cycle.
  • Understand the audit processes.
  • Be proficient with accounting information systems and controls.
  • Understand tax law and compliance.
  • Effectively use research tools.
  • Be globally informed.

The School of Accounting & Taxation creates a synergy between accounting, business, and economic theory and contemporary practice to prepare working professionals and full-time students for careers in a global, culturally diverse, information-driven economy.

Three principles are central to our mission:

• Education - The first, and foremost, is fostering learning through excellent teaching, individual attention, and scholarship, which develops, assesses, and disseminates good practice.
• Research - The second is the application of theory to practice through applied research and scholarship, and the utilization of applied research to further learning in the classroom and through co-curricular activities.
• Community - The third is advancing contemporary practice and creating learning opportunities by contributing to the accounting profession and to business and the community.
• The field of accounting encompasses the well-recognized profession of public accounting including auditing, management advisory services, and tax services; professional careers in industry such as management accounting (controllership), cost accounting, and internal auditing; careers in various governmental agencies and other accounting and business-related fields. (Accounting is defined as the process of gathering, classifying, interpreting, and presenting financial and non-financial information for decision-making purposes to diversified user groups.) 

School of Accounting & Taxation Website

The assessment plan for the School of Accountancy is comprised of activities that refine and develop learning outcomes consistent with our mission, collect data which are indicators of learning, and gather data that indirectly assess the program’s achievements.

The plan to assess the program and student learning is best indicated by the following high-level process and value-chain diagrams:

 Assurance of Learning Cycle

 Accounting Education Value Chain View

 Assessment Plan
 

The latest guidance from AACSB suggests an AoL program that measures student performance less frequently while focusing more efforts on meaningful closing the loop activities. The School of Accounting and Taxation has adjusted our AoL schedule accordingly. We last collected direct measures of student performance in Spring 2020. We will collect again in Spring 2022. In the interim, we are implementing closing the loop activities (curricular changes) that we hope will result in improved student performance across our learning objectives.

Moving forward, we will collect direct measures of student performance and identify closing the loop activities in Spring 2020. We will implement closing the loop activities during Fall 2020, Spring 2021, and Fall 2021, and assess the effectiveness of closing the loop activities in Spring 2022. The cycle will then begin again. 

The School of Accounting and Taxation collects indirect measures of student performance in addition to direct, outcome-based measures of student achievement. The department meets regularly with our Advisory Board. Board members provide feedback regarding our curriculum, including suggestions for potential improvements based on ongoing changes in the accounting profession. Additionally, our graduating students complete an exit survey. Students answer questions addessing the degree to which they feel they’ve met the learning objectives identified in our curriculum map. The accounting faculty discuss these indirect measures during department meetings to identify possible curriculum improvements.  
 

2022-23

2017-18

2012-13