Is Accountancy a Profession? Implications for Education

Abstract

This chapter described the importance of accountancy as profession and its implications for education. Accounting education may well be at a critical point in determining its image as the accounting professions image is at a crossroads. Accounting taught as a subset of business would require that a student study the common body of business knowledge, and pursues an MBA degree at the graduate level. The college graduate would enroll in a school of accountancy, and pursue a Master of Accountancy, or Tax degree, or perhaps a professional doctorate like law, or pharmacy. The education base of the business major will be primarily business with various ranges of liberal arts courses required at different institutions. In contrast, a professional school of accountancy would attract students who are not just trained in liberal arts courses because they were required, but students who elected to concentrate on liberal arts studies because of their mindset. Faculty in a professional school of accountancy would have independence in faculty governance, and in setting standards for research, tenure, and promotion.