Fifth Year Maintenance Report - AACSB - The University of Texas at ...

Master of Accountancy ProgramThe learning goals for the Master of Accountancy (MACY) program are as follows.1. Graduates of the Master of Accountancy program will understand the role of research inadvancing the practice of accounting and taxation.2. Graduates of the Master of Accountancy program will demonstrate competence in both writingand professional presentations.3. Graduates of the Master of Accountancy program will be well grounded in the ethical issuesfacing the accounting profession and will have the tools necessary to respond to those issues.4. Graduates of the Master of Accountancy program will be prepared to enter the accountingprofession.The most recent learning outcomes, methods of assessment and most recent academic year results arepresented in Table 6.4 that is included in the Appendix.The most immediate impact of the assessment of learning program on our master’s programswas the recognition that we did not have sufficient control over several of the programs we were tryingto support to allow us to maintain the quality of learning. We tried to respond to the demands of the150-hour requirement for qualification to sit for the CPA examination in Texas by creating a 12-hourcertificate program. This program had minimal admissions requirements and was to be a vehicle forstudents to obtain additional upper-division (graduate) course work required to qualify for theexamination. By reviewing the performance of the students in that program it was clear they were notworking at the level of the other students. We did not have any mechanism for incentivizing them tocomplete the certificate. The faculty voted in 2007 to discontinue the certificate program.The next issue that arose was with the concentration in accounting in the MBA program. Wehad developed a set of learning goals and assessment tools for that concentration. In attempting toassess the learning of the students in that program it became clear that because the Department ofAccounting did not have control over the admissions to the concentration, it was open to any MBAstudent, that the majority of the students attempting it were not succeeding because they did not havesufficient accounting preparation to take graduate accounting courses. In the 2009-2011 graduatecatalog we tried establishing Intermediate I as a prerequisite for all graduate level accounting classes.As a consequence only a handful of MBA students had the prerequisites but unqualified students werestill trying to obtain admission to the certificate through the MBA program. We directed the MBAprogram to discontinue admitting anyone to the concentration after the Fall 2009 semester and formallyeliminated the program from the 2011-2013 graduate catalog. There are no remaining students ineither a certificate program or an accounting concentration in the MBA.When the last Peer Review Team visited we had two tracks in the Master of Accountancyprogram, a track in taxation and a track in accounting. In developing student learning goals andattempting to assess these two tracks it became clear that they were two different degrees not twodifferent tracks. Students in the taxation track could take up to 24 hours of taxation courses, 21 hoursof which were being taught by adjunct faculty. All of the courses were applied courses with notheoretical underpinnings or research requirements. The accounting track was taught almost entirely bytenure-track faculty, had required theory courses but lacked focus. We did not believe that we couldeffectively compare these two programs or conduct a useful assessment of learning.43