College of Business Graduate Committee

CoB Graduate Committee Minutes

Minutes for 01/26/09

Present:Stan Eakins, Jim Buck,Len Rhodes (Secretary), Melita Prati, Ravi Paul (chair), Cal Christian, John Reisch, Ken MacLeod, Dan Schisler

Absent:

Paul opened the meeting at 1:30PM.

Minutes from 11/13/08 werereviewed. Buckmoved to approved. Prati second. Motion carried.

Agenda Item 1: GSAB Representative Election

Eakins noted that according to CoB code the associate dean is the CoB representative on the Graduate School Administrative Board (GSAB) and must be approved by the Graduate Committee. MacLeod moved that Eakins be approved as the CoB representative on the GSAB. Buck second. Motion carried.

Agenda Item 2: Differential Tuition Increase Defense

Eakins noted that the chancellor has asked our dean for justification for the proposed $40 per credit hour increase in graduate business class tuition differential. Eakins asked the committee for indicators of the quality of our program.

Online MBA provides access without the need for additional classroom space
Online faculty of high quality with required CE credits and training
Online faculty and program on the cutting edge of technology
Many efficiency indicators
SBTDC internships

Agenda Item 3: Proposed MSA Changes

Schisler presented for approval four changes to the MSA program along with the elimination of the BSA/MSA program. The primary drivers for the changes are new federal financial aid laws that result in no reimbursement for graduate students taking undergraduate classes. Since both the MSA and BSA/MSA degrees have significant undergraduate components this causes considerable financial hardship for our students.

Change #1: Elimination of the BSA/MSA program in favor of a separate BSBA in Accounting and a separate MSA (a 4/1 model instead of a 5-year model).

Reason for Change #1: There are several reasons for the elimination of the five-year BSA/MSA program listed below:

1. The first reason concerns financial aid. The BSA/MSA requires undergraduate students to be admitted to graduate school prior to finishing their undergraduate coursework. The new financial aid regulations (per Julie Poorman, Director of Financial Aid) will not allow payment for undergraduate classes for graduate students and vice versa. Considering more than 60% of our MSA students receive financial aid, this causes an unnecessary burden on our students.

2. The second reason concerns the CPA exam. In North Carolina, an individual cannot sit for the CPA exam until he or she has completed (or be within 120 days of completing) an undergraduate degree and has taken 18 hours of upper level accounting courses. A current BSA/MSA student does not receive the undergraduate degree until the end of the fifth year and then receives both the BSA and the MSA. Therefore, a student is not able to sit for a section (four sections of different topics) of the CPA exam in a timely manner (soon after the material is covered) but must wait until the end of the program.

3. With the two programs, there was often a perception of a two-tier program and a difficulty in explaining/marketing the different programs. The original design of the BSA/MSA program was to have a track for individuals wanting to be CPAs and a track for other accounting students that wanted to go into industry or government. However, the recruiters tended to focus on the five-year students and it actually reduced the importance of the graduate degree. In North Carolina (and most other states), one cannot become a CPA without the completion of 150 semester hours of college work (they can take the CPA exam with an undergraduate degree but cannot be certified without 150 hours and work experience).

4. Currently, a student has to make a decision at the beginning of his or her senior year whether or not to go to the five-year BSA/MSA program. If the student then decides to finish the four-year degree either because of failure to get into the graduate school or for other personal reasons, the student must go back and take two additional classes and has some wasted coursework. This along with transfer credit problems makes the 4/1 program much more attractive for the student.

5. For the Banner system, the duel program was/is a nightmare. Accounting students are coded in Banner as either intended accounting majors BSBA, intended accounting majors BSA/MSA, BSBA accounting majors, BSA/MSA undergraduate, BSA/MSA graduate. The coding and registration (not to mention the new CAPP program for senior summaries) will be much simpler with the 4/1 program.

Buck moved to approve change 1. Prati second. Motion carried.

Change #2: Elimination of the MBA core as a requirement for the MSA program for students without a business undergraduate degree (non-business MSA).

Reason for Change #2: Currently, the non-business MSA must take up to 24 semester hours of general business core MBA classes that are not focused on the needs of the CPA or the CPA exam. The MSA differs from the MBA in that the MSA degree is a concentrated accounting masters degree that is designed to enable the accounting MSA to pass the CPA exam and practice as CPAs. The MBA is a general business program that is targeted toward a business management career. Currently, the relatively new section of the CPA exam (Business Environment and Concepts - BEC) is not covered in our MSA program. We are proposing two classes (ACCT 6221 and ACCT 6231) which will allow for coverage of the general business components and the business components specifically covered on the BEC section of the CPA exam. The addition of these classes (and other changes discussed below) reduces the semester hours of the non-business MSA to 45 semester hours. This is consistent with our regional competitors. This change makes our program more attractive to potential students and will allow the Accounting Department to consider bringing the MSA online in the near future. This is in addition to the hopefully higher pass rates on the BEC section of the CPA exam. We have several accounting faculty with Ph.D.’s in Business Administration and MBAs that are qualified to teach these two additional courses.

Prati moved to approve change #2. Buck second. Motion carried.

Change #3:Moving the accounting core courses to the graduate level for the non-business/accounting undergraduate MSA students and the elimination of ACCT 6801.

Reason for Change #3 The financial aid issue addressed in point one above also affects our stand-alone MSA program (the program for students with non-business/accounting undergraduate degrees) since, currently, these MSA have to take the undergraduate accounting concentration courses. Thus, they take both graduate and undergraduate courses during the same semesters until late in their program. As noted earlier, over 60% receive financial aid. If we do not make this change, it will not only limit the growth of our very successful program but will likely substantially reduce the quantity and quality of our MSA students. This change will require the development of three new graduate ACCT courses which are combinations of the six undergraduate core accounting courses (two undergraduate courses rolled into one graduate course). The faculty members currently teaching the undergraduate core courses each have a third preparation (a low level accounting principles course). We have an instructor to teach those additional principle sections and the Ph.D. faculty will teach the two undergraduates courses and the new graduate course (essentially the same preparation). This change along with the elimination of ACCT 6801 – Accounting Theory will enable the department to initiate this change with no additional faculty.

MacLeod moved to approve change #3. Christian second. Motion carried.

Change #4: The addition of nine hours of track electives.

Reason for Change #4: Currently, in the MSA program includes one elective course and an optional tax concentration program. At this time, the only electives are tax electives. However, the hiring market for beginning CPAs has shifted more to the auditing area. Approximately 60 to 70% of our graduates start in auditing type positions. This program change will allow students to select from 9 hours of accounting track electives. The students can take 9 hours of taxation (with the existing courses) or 9 hours of auditing track electives or a mixture of taxation/audit courses. The addition of the audit track will require two new graduate courses – ACCT 6961 (IT Auditing) and ACCT 6971 (Corporate Governance). ACCT 6301 – Fraud which is already offered as an MBA elective, will be the third audit track course. These classes will be offered once a year (unless demand dictates otherwise). We currently have five faculty with extensive auditing education and experience able to teach these courses.

Buck moved to approve change #4. Prati second. Motion carried.

Agenda Item 4: New Business

Eakins suggested that it was time to gather ideas for curriculum changes to the MBA. All committee members are to discuss with his or her respective departments and return to the committee at its next meeting.

Action Item: Rhodes to schedule next committee meeting for approximately six weeks from today.

The meeting adjourned at 3:00PM.

Submitted by Len Rhodes, secretary