BE-512 Contemporary Issues in International Accounting

ECTS Credits:: 7.5
Responsible department:: School of Business and Law
Course Leader:: Bjørn Einar Strandberg
Lecture Semester:: Autumn
Teaching language:: English.
Duration:: 1 term

Schedule (TP) Reading list (Leganto)

The course is connected to the following study programs

Master's Programme in Accounting and Auditing
Master's Programme in Business Administration

Teaching language

English.

Prerequisites

BE-507 Accounting 5 (or equivalent)

Additional pre-requisites: In addition to a broad and comprehensive knowledge of the main principles for accounting under International Financial Reporting Standards, a thorough understanding of conceptual frameworks for accounting is beneficial. It is further recommended to have completed a course in accounting theory.

Course contents

The course is based on the most recent and ongoing discussions in international accounting and standard setting activities. After an introduction on conceptual frameworks for accounting, key concepts and theories and certain cross sections of the accounting regulation, the course uses recent cases from the standard setters and regulators to illustrate how these concepts are used to conclude on the most appropriate accounting. When discussing the cases, the existing body of literature and standards are revisited that are relevant for the case, thus reaffirming knowledge from prior courses. The course is problem focused with the ambition of strengthening critical thinking and identifying alternative views and approaches.

Learning outcomes

Upon successful completion of this course the student should, using contemporary accounting issues, be able to:

Identify conflicts between various objectives for financial reporting.
Explain the advantages of principle-based accounting regulation.
Identify and discuss inconsistencies in the current accounting regulation across different standards
Reflect on how the scope of different standards put pressures on the accounting definitions and may lead to accounting arbitrage
Analyze contemporary accounting issues, suggest reasonable solutions and comment on existing points of view.

Examination requirements

Approved mandatory assignment.

Teaching methods

As the course is based on current issues and therefore case based, weekly lectures will form the basis. The cases and issues presented in the lectures will be analyzed and students will have to prepare short resumes of the key accounting concepts involved and how they compete and are weighted against each other.

During the course, the students are required to hand in an essay based on a problem presented by the lecturer. This hand in will not be graded, but feedback will be provided. The hand-in may be prepared in pairs of two if warranted.

Students will also be asked to prepare for each lecture by reading relevant case papers from the literature as identified by the lecturer. Towards the end of the course, students will be challenged to briefly present in class their observations from the case readings.

Evaluation

The person responsible for the course decides, in cooperation with student representatives, the form of student evaluation and whether the course is to have a midway or end of course evaluation in accordance with the quality system for education, chapter 4.1.