TEACHING MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING: A COMPARATIVE

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SBAJ: 8(2): Ajibolade et al.: International Approaches. 128INTERNATIONAL APPROACHES TOTHE TEACHING MANAGEMENTACCOUNTING: A COMPARATIVESTUDYSola Ajibolade, University of Lagos, NigeriaEddy Omolehinwa, University of Lagos, NigeriaLadelle Hyman, Texas Southern University, Houston, TX.ABSTRACTThis paper reports a comparative study of the teaching of managementaccounting at the undergraduate level in a US-based business schooland a business faculty in a Nigerian university. The purpose is tohighlight similarities and differences in the designing and teaching ofmanagement accounting, with a view to influencing improvements inthe system of transmitting management accounting education. Thestudy yields data on seven different cost and management accountingcourses taught at different levels of study at the two institutions.Analysis of the curricula on a number of dimensions reveals somesimilarities in content and pedagogy. However, substantial differencesare noted in terms of coverage of contemporary issues; the extent of useof information technology, case methods and team projects; and thepartitioning of the curricula to facilitate students’ learning. The

SBAJ: 8(2), Fall 2008: Ajibolade et al.: International .129management accounting curricula in the institutions may require someimprovement; some approaches are suggested in this study.INTRODUCTIONThe stiffer competition experienced by firms as a corollaryof globalization, has imposed on them a greater need for resourcemanagement efficiency. Management accounting is a critical factorin the drive for the efficient use of resources to maintaincompetitiveness in the dynamic and competitive globalenvironment (IFAC, 1998). Management accounting performs thecrucial role of providing information to enable effective planning,controlling and decision making. Management accountingeducation should therefore adequately prepare recipients for thefullest appreciation of this crucial role in organizations. It isimportant that those who will manage organizations in the currentglobal environment should be equipped with appropriatemanagement accounting education, as their actions and decisionsare going to be driven by their level of knowledge.Thein (2006) however, notes that management accountingas a course is often regarded as one of the toughest subjects, forstudents in business schools. The authors‘ teaching experience alsobuttresses this point, revealing that the pass rates recorded inmany management accounting examinations are often lower thanin other business and accounting courses. This trend seems tosuggest that students are not effectively learning managementaccounting to be able to add value to the organizations where theywould be engaged.

SBAJ: 8(2), Fall 2008: Ajibolade et al.: International .130Thein (2006) offers a number of reasons for this―toughness‖, which include among others too tight curriculum andnon-motivating pedagogy. Richardson (2003) also argues that inmany universities, professors offer the same subject using the samepedagogy as they have for the past twenty years, without furtherthought to their relevance in the contemporary business climate.Approaches have therefore been suggested for revampingmanagement accounting curriculum. Burns‘ (1968) earliersuggestion of an approach to developing or revamping anaccounting course is to review what has been done in similarcourses at either one‘s own institution or other universities.Palmer (as cited in Hanno, 1999) also argues that continuingthoughtful discussions about teaching should promote anenvironment where good teaching can flourish. Unfortunately heobserves, this is absent in many environment, as faculty oftenlabours in a private world of teaching. It is necessary that thosedelivering knowledge be exposed to different ways of teachingstudents. Knowing what takes place in other parts of the worldmay help in improving systems of educating managementaccounting students.The objective of this study therefore, is to review theframeworks for organizing the teaching of management accountingin two schools from unique environments, where the authors havehad experiences in designing and teaching managementaccounting at different levels of students‘ education. The studyexamines and documents noteworthy similarities and differencesin the extent of coverage of relevant issues, the mode ofpartitioning management accounting courses and the teachingmethods in the Faculty of Business Administration, University ofLagos (FBA, Unilag), Nigeria and in the Jesse H. Jones School of

SBAJ: 8(2), Fall 2008: Ajibolade et al.: International .131Business (JHJ), Texas Southern University, USA. The keyquestions guiding the study are as follows: Are the managementaccounting curricula in these schools relevant to the competitiveglobal business climate? Is the partitioning of the curricula done ina way that will facilitate students‘ learning? Is the pedagogyadopted able to facilitate students learning and acquisition of theappropriate level of knowledge? In its contribution, the paper aimsat suggesting ways that the findings may be used as a basis foreither improving the systems or influencing what takes place inother systems to the benefit of accounting education. The findingsare also aimed at assisting faculty who might be consideringteaching management accounting in environments different fromtheir domicile to determine the level of skills required of them.MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING EDUCATIONManagement accounting concepts have been traced backto the integrated cotton textile factories as early as 1815 (Johnsonand Kaplan, 1987). The teaching of management accounting inmanagement education however, appears to have gotten off theground only in the late 1940s, perhaps taking off from the work ofW. J. Valter at the University of Chicago and later embraced atHarvard University and at Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology (MIT) (Maher, 2000). This is understandable asbusiness management education itself, as a program in theuniversity, is reported to have started in the United States ofAmerica at MIT in 1931. The second program, dating back to1943, was at Harvard (Maher, 2000).

SBAJ: 8(2), Fall 2008: Ajibolade et al.: International .132Management accounting education comprises disciplinesconcerned with the provision of information for internal use asagainst the external reporting focus of financial accounting.Although, management accounting education is often divided intocost accounting and management accounting, the distinction is notclear-cut in many curricula and textbooks. Topics discussed in costaccounting textbooks and syllabi also often appear in managementaccounting textbooks and syllabi. While some managementaccounting educators treat cost accounting as a precursor tomanagement accounting, playing the same role that intermediateaccounting does to financial accounting, others treat costaccounting as quite different from management accounting(Maher, 2000).Anthony (1989) noting a difference in focus between earlycost accounting courses and textbooks and managementaccounting suggests that cost accounting courses and textbookswere focused on procedural issues, while management accountingconcentrated on management and behavioural issues. Much ofearly textbooks on management accounting were devoted to costaccounting with a concern for procedural issues such as productcosting and inventory valuation. Maher (2000) suggests that thefoundation of many management accounting courses andtextbooks was provided by Robert Anthony‘s (1956) managementaccounting textbook. The book used cases instead of problems andprovided a three way classification of cost concepts – full costs,differential costs, and responsibility costs thus directing attentiontowards production of cost information for decision making.Management accounting began to pay more attention to decisionmaking and less to product costing and inventory valuation inconventional cost accounting. By 1960s, mathematical modelings,including applications of operations research to accounting, were

SBAJ: 8(2), Fall 2008: Ajibolade et al.: International .133introduced into management accounting. As a follow-up to thecriticisms of management accounting, started off by Kaplan(1984), many new topics like activity-based costing (ABC),economic value-added (EVA), balanced scorecard (BSC), throughputaccounting/theory of constraints (TOC) and target costing wereadded to the management accounting curriculum.Researchers have noted that at the onset, accountingcurriculum models have placed heavier emphasis on financialaccounting and little emphasis on management accounting. Maher(2000) notes that, the emphasis on financial accounting in theaccounting curriculum about twenty years ago was about 70% to80%, with only 20% to 30% emphasis on managementaccounting. He, however, concludes that students of accountingand other business students are today exposed to moremanagement accounting than they were then with a commonmodel giving a 50-50 allocation to management and financialaccounting. Management accounting educators have alsodecreased emphasis on cost accounting, in accordance with thereduced need for accumulating and ordering data in companies,while increasing their emphasis on cost management andmanagement accounting.Management accounting for effective teaching andlearning purposes is often partitioned into two or more courses,taught as core courses for accounting students as well as anintroductory course for all business students in many businessschools.

SBAJ: 8(2), Fall 2008: Ajibolade et al.: International .134Management Accounting Education in the Faculty of BusinessAdministration, University of Lagos, NigeriaNigeria, a Federal Republic is located on the West Coast ofAfrica with 36 states and a recorded population of over 120 millionpeople, out of which an estimated 30 million are students(Embassy of the United States, 2009). The language of instructionin Nigerian institutions is English. Accounting education inNigeria is undertaken in tertiary institutions of learning includinguniversities and polytechnics as well as in professional traininginstitutions. All applicants seeking undergraduate admission into aNigerian university are required to pass the Senior SecondaryCertificate Examination (SSCE) with at least a Credit level pass inEnglish and four other courses relevant to their major.A candidate applying for admission to study Accountingwill be required to have a minimum of a Credit pass inMathematics, English, Economics and two other subjects of theSSCE. The candidate is also required to pass the UniversitiesMatriculation Examination (UME) conducted by the JointAdmissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), the bodyempowered to conduct Matriculation Examinations for entry intoall degree awarding institutions in Nigeria. The candidate mustregister for English Language, Mathematics, Economics and oneother subject relevant to accounting (JAMB Brochure, 2008).Business School education began in Nigeria with therecommendation of the Ashby Commission on ―Post-SchoolCertificate and Higher Education‖ appointed by the FederalGovernment in 1959. The Commission recommended, among otherthings, the establishment of a University in Lagos, which wouldgive special emphasis to ―School of Commerce and BusinessAdministration‖. It was recognized that Lagos, as the then

SBAJ: 8(2), Fall 2008: Ajibolade et al.: International .135political and business capital of the Federation, would be an idealsite for an institution of higher learning geared towards producingmanagers, accountants and administrators for the private as wellas the public sectors of the economy.The University of Lagos began in October 1962, with theestablishment of the Faculty of Business and Social Studies, theFaculty of Law and the Medical School (then an independent unitwhich later became the College of Medicine of the University).Between October 1962 and August 1970, the Faculty took shapewith substantial aid, in terms of personnel and physical resources,from the United States of America Industrial Development andfrom New York University (NYU). The NYU – University ofLagos Project, was responsible for the establishment anddevelopment of the Faculty of Business Administration. In 1967,the Faculty of Business and Social Sciences was split into twoschools, i.e., School of Administration and School of SocialStudies. Effective October 1973, the School of Administration wasrenamed the Faculty of Business Administration while the Schoolof Social Studies became the Faculty of Social Sciences.Currently, the Faculty of Business Administration with aStudent enrollment of 2,791 (undergraduates) and 1,000 (postgraduates) in the 2007/2008 academic year offers courses leading toDegrees of Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) in Accounting; ActuarialScience; Business Administration; Finance; Insurance; andIndustrial Relations and Personnel Management. The programmeof Master of Business Administration (MBA), designed especiallyto meet the requirements of Nigerian Business Executives,commenced from the 1973/74 Session. This programme is currentlyrun on a day (full time) – and evening (part time) - basis. In

SBAJ: 8(2), Fall 2008: Ajibolade et al.: International .136addition, the Faculty offers Postgraduate courses leading to theM.Sc., M.Phil, and Ph.D. degrees in various business disciplines.Undergraduate and Postgraduate Programmes leading tothe various degrees in accounting are offered in the Department ofAccounting, which took off in 1962, the same year the Universitywas established. A higher emphasis is on the undergraduateprogramme with students‘ enrolment increasing steadily, from theinitial figure of about 50 at inception to about 800 in 2008(Faculty of Business Administration, 2008).The undergraduate accounting programme leading to aBachelor of Science (B.Sc.) degree in accounting is a four-yearprogramme in which students are required to take core accountingcourses along with courses in law, management, finance,economics and general studies. The core accounting coursesavailable numbering about eighteen are as follows: Introduction toFinancial Accounting (ACC110); Introduction to Cost Accounting(ACC120); Principle of Accounting (ACC210); Elements of CostAccounting (ACC220); Advanced Cost Accounting (ACC310)(Prerequisite ACC220); Financial Accounting (ACC311) (Prerequisite ACC210); Taxation I (ACC312); Management AccountingI (ACC320); Accounting Theory (ACC321); Principles of Auditing(ACC322); Research Methodology in Accounting (ACC323);Management Accounting II (ACC410); Advanced FinancialAccounting I (ACC411); Public Sector Accounting (ACC412);Auditing and Investigations (ACC420); Management InformationSystems and Computer Application (ACC421); Taxation II(ACC422) and Advanced Financial Accounting II (ACC423).

SBAJ: 8(2), Fall 2008: Ajibolade et al.: International .137Included among these eighteen core accounting courses arefive cost and management accounting courses. These are:Introduction to Cost Accounting (ACC120), recently introducedinto the curriculum to enable accounting students cover enoughintroductory topics in cost accounting as the class usually neverhas enough time to thoroughly examine the numerous topicsincluded in ACC220; Elements of Cost Accounting (ACC220) isoffered to accounting students as well as other business students atthe 200level (second year). The course is designed to expose allbusiness students to a wide range of traditional topics in costaccounting such as: cost concepts, cost classification, material,labor, and overhead costing, job-order costing, marginal andabsorption costing; Advanced Cost Accounting (ACC310 Prerequisite ACC220), offered to only accounting majors at the300 level in the first semester deals with in depth coverage oftopics in ACC220 and it also includes treatment of other topicssuch as process costing and (Activity Based Costing) ABC;Management Accounting I (ACC320 - Prerequisite ACC220),offered to only accounting students at the 300 level in the secondsemester introduces additional topics such as budgeting; andManagement Accounting II (ACC410), offered by only accountingstudents in the final year of study. (These management accountingcourses at the 300 and 400 levels are however available to studentsof finance as elective courses).The management accounting curriculum model adopted inthis school thus organizes management accounting teaching in fivepartitions spreading through the first to the final year of study.The students are taken through these courses using recommendedtextbooks by Nigerian and foreign authors. One of the majorrecommended textbook is authored by Omolehinwa (2002).

SBAJ: 8(2), Fall 2008: Ajibolade et al.: International .138Management Accounting Education at the Jesse H. Jones School ofBusiness, Texas Southern University, USAThe Texas Southern University is a historically blackcollege (HBCU) located in Houston, Texas. The teaching andresearch intensive institution of higher education has anenrollment of more than 10,800 students and 900 faculty and staff.The university was established in 1947 with managementeducation introduced at inception. The program was originallyorganized as the Department of Business Administration withinthe College of Arts and Sciences. As a result of steady increase inenrollment, due to accelerating economic growth, the program wasexpanded and the Department was elevated to a Division status.During the 1954-1955 academic year, approximately 400 students,20 percent of the enrollment of the College of Arts and Scienceswere pursuing degrees in the Division of Business.The University soon recognized that the community‘sresponse to its thrust in business education required a separatefaculty and its own dean. This decision resulted in theestablishment of the School of Business in 1955, the Jesse H. JonesSchool of Business (JHJ). The school is the first HBCU businessschool to receive accreditation by the Association to AdvanceCollegiate Schools of Business (AACSB International). Theprimary emphasis of the JHJ School of Business is on theundergraduate program. JHJ currently offers a bachelor ofbusiness administration (BBA) in Accounting, Marketing,Finance, and Management. A master of business administration(MBA) program—including an MBA/JD—is, however, alsoavailable.

SBAJ: 8(2), Fall 2008: Ajibolade et al.: International .139Admissions requirements to the undergraduate accountingprogram at the Texas Southern University are as follows:―(1) gain admission to the University (2) fulfill prerequisiterequirements for a major or minor in General Business (3) satisfyTASP requirements through the General University AcademicCenter (or GUAC) and (4) apply for admission to the tp://www.tsu.edu/pages/576.asp).The university provides equal educational opportunity toall graduates of accredited high schools in the United States andforeign countries and mature adults who have successfully passedthe GED examination. The University has an open admissionspolicy. However, all entrants must meet the Texas SuccessInitiative requirements outlined below and be able to demonstratetheir ability to perform successfully at the college level. TheAmerican College Test (ACT) or the Scholastic Aptitude Test(SAT) is recommended. These test scores are used for evaluationpurposes. Each new student is required to take the ASSET orTHEA test prior to enrolling at Texas Southern University. Thistest determines foundation course selections at the time g/12 admissions.pdf).The bachelor of business administration degree inAccounting is offered through the Department of Accounting andFinance, which also offers a BBA in Finance. No graduate leveldegrees are offered through this unit. Courses in Accounting,Finance, Information

management accounting, with a view to influencing improvements in the system of transmitting management accounting education. The study yields data on seven different cost and management accounting courses taught at different levels of study at the two institutions. Analysis of

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