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ABSTRACTThis paper extends the self-reflections presented earlier in Stout (2016) to include some of the things I learned over the years in terms of publishing in accounting education. I offer these new reflections from the perspective of my experience over many years as an author, editor, and consumer of accounting education literature. I provide comments related to publishing instructional resources in accounting education (including educational cases) and to publishing research articles. I also offer general comments regarding publishing in accounting education, including comments as to the suitability (defensibility) of these scholarly pursuits. The manuscript complements other recent papers in the area by focusing more narrowly on the publication process in accounting education. The contents of this paper may be of interest to those wishing to enhance their publication potential in the field of accounting education.

ABSTRACTThis paper provides best practices evidence from a sample of accounting educators in the U.S. recognized formally for their teaching excellence. These teaching exemplars were surveyed and asked to list, in their own words and in ranked order of importance, "a minimum of three and up to five factors or qualities of your teaching that you believe have helped distinguish you as an effective teacher." We received 453 responses to this question from our sample of 105 award-winning accounting educators. A content analysis of these responses suggests the following major characteristics of teaching effectiveness in accounting (in decreasing order of perceived importance): class session learning environment, student focus, preparation and organization, importance of the practice environment, passion and commitment to teaching (as a profession), and the design of the course learning environment. Response breakdowns suggest the existence of contextual effects: differences in importance ratings for selected characteristics of teaching effectiveness were observed with respect to respondent professorial rank, years of full-time teaching experience, and gender. Results shine a light on teaching effectiveness in accounting education providing, for the first time, both evidence of the perceived relative importance of specific characteristics, as well as insights on pedagogical knowledge to guide educator classroom pursuits.

ABSTRACT: Elora Electronics, Limited (EEL), a fictitious company, manufactures sophisticated, high-tech electronic equipment. Though successful in the past, the company has seen a decline in the number of bids it has won. Management is especially concerned about the bids the company recently lost on one of its main products, a sophisticated radar system. Most of the contracts for EEL, including those for the radar system, are bid on a "cost-plus" basis. Up to this point, divisional managers have used a simple average of recent actual costs to estimate costs for contract-bidding purposes. Such a procedure was deemed useful for cost-control purposes because actual costs have consistently been below budgeted costs. However, given the changed competitive environment in which EEL now finds itself, these managers are now wondering whether the contract-bidding process can be made more successful through the use of a more sophisticated approach to cost estimation.
For purposes of completing this case, assume that you were recently hired by EEL as a management accountant for the Radar Unit. For your first assignment you have been asked to use Excel (or other software, such as SPSS) to analyze and model the direct labor-hour (DLH) consumption associated with the production of radar units. (The production of these units requires a significant amount of highly skilled labor.) You have a set of historical observations to which you've been asked to fit both linear and nonlinear functions (in the form of learning curves); these observations relate to the last 14 radar units produced by EEL. Among other tasks, you will need to generate and interpret for management the statistical output associated with the model-fitting task and to recommend to the company a particular model for cost-estimation purposes. There is an expectation that the model you recommend will be used by EEL for contract-bidding purposes. To prepare adequately for your cost-analysis project, you will need to complete two "refresher" tutorials presented as appendices to the case.

ABSTRACTSurveys of practitioners point to the importance of leadership skills in the accounting profession. However, leadership is not currently emphasized much within accounting curricula. Further, a review of the accounting education literature indicates a lack of instructional resources for accounting faculty desiring to help students develop leadership skills. As a result, accounting students may graduate without the mindset required to think of themselves as potential leaders. Therefore, there are opportunities to add value to accounting curricula by intervening in the area of leadership development. This article describes one such intervention that can be used as part of a comprehensive approach to leadership development. The primary goal of this three-week module is modest but important: to help instill a leadership mindset in accounting students. The class-tested module consists of targeted cases and supplementary readings covering six primary leadership topics. These topics were selected to build upon leadership material covered in a basic management course. While the module was used in undergraduate cost accounting, it (or a suitably reduced version of it) is appropriate for use in other accounting courses, particularly upper-level courses. This article offers implementation guidance and resources for the accounting instructor, including access to electronic files that can be used to teach the module. Assessment data from the students who recently completed this module indicate that they viewed the module as a beneficial learning experience.

ABSTRACTThe AAA/J. Michael and Mary Anne Cook/Deloitte Foundation Prize is an award designed to recognize up to three currently active faculty members annually for teaching excellence in accounting. This paper has a three-fold objective: (1) provide an additional mechanism for promoting the Cook Prize as a formal means of rewarding and—in the words of the Pathways Commission (2012)—"shining a light" on teaching excellence in accounting; (2) share with other accounting faculty the self-reflective insights on effective and ineffective teaching practices from the first six recipients of the Cook Prize; and (3) compare Cook Prize recipient responses to those of other accounting educator exemplars reported previously in the literature. With regard to categorical identification of effective and ineffective teaching practices, we find general agreement between Cook Prize recipients and accounting educator exemplars, as reported by Stout and Wygal (2010) and Wygal and Stout (2015). Further analysis identifies purposeful planning perspectives common to Cook Prize respondents that inform their teaching strategies. Collectively, these insights from accounting exemplars should be of interest to accounting faculty members who wish to improve their teaching effectiveness, to individuals considering a teaching career in accounting, and to those seeking to inform their professional/teaching development.

The authors of this manuscript have served as editors of two major accounting education journals for the decade ending in 2005. During this period, we evaluated approximately 500 research manuscripts submitted to the "Main Section" of Issues in Accounting Education and the Journal of Accounting Education. We performed a content-analysis of the files of research manuscripts that had been rejected to determine both primary and secondary reasons for rejection. We find that, by far, most manuscript rejections occur after a first-round review (i.e., after initial submission). We also find that, for the most part, the reasons accounting education research manuscripts are rejected are consistent over time, journal, and editor. The reasons for rejection are generally manifested early in the life of the project. Primary reasons for rejection are (1) a poorly motivated study, (2) a poorly designed study, and/or (3) an insignificant contribution to the accounting education literature. Poor writing is a common secondary reason for rejecting accounting education research manuscripts. The most common reason a manuscript was rejected after resubmission was the failure of the author to adequately address concerns expressed by reviewers and the editor during previous review rounds. We include an appendix that provides sources of guidance for getting manuscripts published in accounting education journals.

ABSTRACTPrior research and practitioner-academic bodies (Lawson et al. 2014; Lawson et al. 2015; Pathways Commission 2012) have called for the development of integrated accounting curricula to better prepare students for successful long-term careers. This paper recognizes accounting program leaders as important agents in the curricular-change process. Its goal is to provide accounting leaders ideas and tools that can be used to manage the process of implementing change to an integrated accounting curriculum. Using a life-cycle planning approach, we identify major stages in the curricular-change process and describe the characteristics and challenges associated with each stage. We then propose a framework for managing the curricular-change process based on the life-cycle approach, encompassing a comprehensive integration process and including spreadsheet formats to facilitate management of an institution's curricular-change initiative. While needed in an effort to develop an integrated curriculum, the approach is generalizable and can be used in any major revision of a curriculum. Appendix A of the paper contains a checklist of issues to be considered during each stage of the curricular-change cycle.

ABSTRACTThe paper follows up on Lawson et al. (2014), which reported on the work of a joint task force sponsored by the Management Accounting Section (MAS) of the American Accounting Association (AAA) and the Institute of Management Accountants (IMA) charged with the responsibility of developing curricular recommendations for accounting education. The current paper extends the discussion by examining possibilities for integrating foundational competencies and broad management competencies into the accounting curriculum, and for integrating across various accounting competencies. The paper provides a detailed example to illustrate its recommendations. The paper also discusses two implementation challenges related to curriculum integration and offers some thoughts for productively responding to them. Finally, the paper includes three appendices that contain an additional example and list additional resources for instructors to support curricular-integration initiatives in accounting.

ABSTRACTProfessional organizations, accrediting bodies, and accounting educators have defined the competencies that accounting students need for entry-level success in public accounting. However, definitions of the competencies required by all accounting students for long-term career requirements are lacking, as is an understanding of how to develop these competencies within the accounting curriculum. In 2010 the Institute of Management Accountants (IMA) and the Management Accounting Section (MAS) of the American Accounting Association (AAA) formed a Task Force to address these issues and make curriculum recommendations for all accounting majors. This paper is a report of that Task Force. It is responsive to the recent call to "connect the accounting body of knowledge to a map of competencies" and to create "curricular models for the future" (Pathways Commission 2012, 37, 75), and it includes a literature review that spans the scope and focus of accounting education, the value proposition for accounting (i.e., specification as to how accountants today, working in a variety of settings, add organizational value), and the importance of competency integration. This review leads to four recommendations. First, accounting education should be oriented toward long-term career demands. Second, the focus of accounting education should include organizational settings beyond the current focus on public accounting/auditing. Third, educational objectives should reflect how accountants add organizational value. Fourth, these objectives should be developed as integrated competencies. These recommendations lead to the competency-based educational Framework presented in this paper. This Framework is intended to apply to a variety of career paths including, but not limited to, public accounting. The paper concludes with a call to accountants in all areas to participate in further development of the Framework.