Bean Counting: Alive & Well At B-School

 University of Wisconsin's Grainger Hall in the Wisconsin School of Business.  - Jeff Miller

University of Wisconsin’s Grainger Hall in the Wisconsin School of Business. – Jeff Miller

DISPELLING STEREOTYPES ABOUT ACCOUNTING

The AICPA is working hard to make sure that accounting is a profession still on students’ radar as the number of students taking the CPA, considered the gold standard in the accounting and finance industry, has slowed down in the last few years. To counteract that, the group is doing everything from creating websites geared toward college students, organizing accounting competitions and scholarships and trying to dispel some of the stereotypes that exist around the accounting field, Blough said.

Accounting is a popular major at Texas A&M University’s Mays Business School, with about 260 students enrolled each year in the school’s professional program, a five-year program where students earn a BBA in accounting and a Master of Science from the business school in their major of choice. The program lets students earn the 150 credit hours required to sit for the CPA exam and a graduate degree, an attractive value proposition for many, says James Benjamin, head of the accounting department.

He’s happy with the school’s enrollment figures in accounting but remains wary of enrollment dips. He’s seen demand for other majors, such as finance and supply chain management, skyrocket on campus in the last few years. Two years ago, he convened a special advisory council meeting with employers that recruit at the school to warn them there may not be as many potential future hires for them.

SOUNDING THE ALARM BELL

“I came in sounding the alarm bell a few years ago with the economy heating up.  and other majors having good job opportunities. I didn’t think the enrollment numbers would hold up,” says Benjamin. “The employers have laughed at me because turns out I was wrong. I’m glad they’re laughing at me, but I still worry about it.“

It can be a challenge for accounting departments and professors to convey the appeal of the profession to today’s millenials, many of who often don’t even consider the career when they step foot into business school their freshman year. That’s something Alex Dontoh, deputy chair of the accounting department at New York University’s Stern School of Business comes up against every fall when the new freshman class arrives.

“When students come in here, they want to do finance or marketing, and go work for Goldman Sachs,” Dontoh said. “It is very difficult to convince them otherwise, but we do.”

BRINGING ACCOUNTING EXECUTIVES INTO THE CLASSROOM

He raises students’ awareness by bringing accounting executives into the classroom, making them aware of scholarships available to them and getting them to understand the numerous paths and specializations students can pursue in the field.

Those efforts have paid off handsomely for Dontoh.  Today, accounting is the third most popular major at New York University’s Stern School of Business, with 162 students doing a concentration in general accounting, about 65 of whom plan to go on to earn a master of science through the undergraduate school.

The school recently added a new graduate-level master of science in accounting program that will start in the fall of 2016, based on growing interest in the field from students outside of Stern, Dontoh says. “What ultimately drives the popularity of accounting is that it is recession proof,” he says. “It is one of the few professions that you can typically find steady employment in when things go sour.”

ACCOUNTING ENROLLMENT STEADY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN

Accounting enrollments have held steady at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s School of Business, where about 472 students have signed up to major in accounting this fall as of October, down just slightly from last year, according to Terry Warfield, the head of the business school’s accounting and information systems department.  About two-thirds of those students end up pursuing the school’s Integrated Master of Accountancy, an additional fifth year that allows them to earn the 150 credits hours needed to sit for the CPA, and gives them internship opportunities. Students that pursue the master’s program are encouraged to take coursework in finance, risk management or human resources to broaden their understanding of how accounting fits into the business world, Warfield says.

“Once students take their first couple of accounting classes, they find that accounting is not as dreary as they thought and we dispel some of the myths,” he says. “When they look at our program and see they can get a master’s degree in five years, all of a sudden accounting looks pretty attractive.”

Looking ahead, it’s unclear whether accounting will continue to hold the same sway for students. There’s been a slight widening in the gap between the number of students graduating with accounting degrees and the number sitting for the CPA exam, says the AICPA’s Rebecca Blough, though the gap has slowed a bit since 2011-12. In addition, the number of students who were awarded bachelor’s degrees in accounting in the 2013-14 academic year also dipped 11 percent from the last survey, though that could be due to the ways schools report the data to AICPA about their master’s candidates, Blough says.

‘BEAN COUNTER, SHMEAN COUNTER’

The group is examining why fewer students are sitting for the CPA exam, and plans to unveil some initiatives next year that will address the issue, Blough said. In the meantime, the group is working hard with schools to make sure that students view accounting as both a stable, lucrative and even hip profession. The AICPA’s student website, thiswaytocpa.com, features articles with titles like “Bean Counter, Shmean Counter,” interview simulations and day-in-the-life interviews with people with accounting degrees working in fields like financial forensics and personal financial planning.

Beyond that, the most important thing schools can do to encourage the next generation of accountants is by fostering a genuine “CPA Culture” on campus, adds Blough. This includes having faculty encouraging students to learn about the exam, a curriculum that allows students to specialize in a subset of the accounting field, and having a strong employer presence on campus.

“This helps students see past graduation that they’ll have support in pursuing this career path,” she says. “Students today are really seeing value of CPA brand and want to get there, they just need help to do it.”

Questions about this article? Email us or leave a comment below.