Many college in the USA and worldwide are involved that accounting enrollments are dropping. The variety of U.S. college students finishing bachelor’s levels in accounting declined from 2016 to 2020, in accordance with the AICPA’s 2021 Traits Report. The variety of college students in U.Okay. accounting packages declined from 2016 to 2020, in accordance with the Monetary Reporting Council, and accountant shortages have been reported in nations together with Malaysia and South Africa.
Although a few of this decline can possible be attributed to the pandemic, and to demographic developments which have led to a drop within the variety of faculty college students as a complete, accounting college should still wish to do what they will to draw extra college students to the foremost.
Accounting college should actively recruit college students, mentioned Elizabeth Gordon, CPA, Ph.D. She’s been in academia for greater than twenty years, and through that point, college students have modified, mentioned Gordon, chair of the division of accounting on the Fox College of Enterprise at Temple College in Philadelphia.
Right this moment’s college students are looking for careers that mix ardour and function, she mentioned. It is vital for college members to indicate college students that accounting affords each. That is very true as new majors develop in reputation and typically supply larger beginning salaries, Gordon mentioned.
Temple is a big public college the place many accounting majors come from group schools, which noticed declining enrollments in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, Gordon mentioned. Specialists agree that enrollment developments are cyclical. However proper now, the business is dealing with a problem that requires assistance on a number of fronts, mentioned Mark Dawkins, CPA, CGMA, Ph.D.
Dawkins is a professor of accounting on the College of North Florida in Jacksonville and present president of the American Accounting Affiliation. “That is all-hands-on-deck,” he mentioned, including that fixing the issue will take a concerted effort by college, corporations, and state societies.
Belief Chireka, ACMA, CGMA, is a senior lecturer of accounting at Walter Sisulu College in South Africa. “There was a worrying decline within the variety of college students enrolling in accounting packages in larger schooling establishments right here in South Africa,” he mentioned. Most South African college students in college accounting packages started finding out accounting in highschool, the place it may be a difficult topic to know. “The scarcity of expert accounting lecturers within the excessive faculties exacerbates the battle,” Chireka mentioned.
four methods college can entice accounting majors
“We really feel prefer it’s a really complicated downside,” mentioned Kathleen Schaum, govt director of college expertise acquisition at KPMG. Schaum, who’s primarily based in San Francisco, helps the agency recruit about 9,000 latest graduates annually. “We’re attempting to assault from a wide range of views,” she mentioned.
Schaum, Chireka, Dawkins, and Gordon supplied these suggestions for the way college can entice accounting majors:
Actively recruit college students to accounting. Incomes a U.S. CPA credential requires an intense slate of coursework and exams, and plenty of different nations have strict academic requirements for accountants. That is one cause universities, corporations, and associations want to succeed in out to younger college students and steer them towards the occupation.
For instance, KPMG has partnered with the College of Houston and the Nationwide Affiliation of Black Accountants to host secondary college college students for excursions at its native workplace as a part of a weeklong program. It is vital to determine potential accounting majors early, Schaum mentioned. Her agency lately hosted 150 first- and second-year faculty college students from underrepresented backgrounds at its new coaching heart in Orlando, Fla. The contributors had been nominated by their professors, and “most of these college students walked away considering, ‘I wish to main in accounting,'” she mentioned.
Temple held its first residency program for underserved highschool college students with an curiosity in accounting this summer season and is making ready to host an accounting profession day in October for a number of hundred Philadelphia secondary college college students in partnership with the Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs. Native accounting corporations have funded the residency program for 3 years, Gordon mentioned. Professors can search this sort of assist by contacting the corporations that recruit their college students or connecting with alumni within the accounting subject. Gordon’s division goals to succeed in new and undecided college students by supporting accounting golf equipment and providing information classes on matters that apply to accounting college students all through their faculty journey, she mentioned.
In South Africa, it is equally vital to draw college students early since they can not qualify for a lot of college accounting packages except they full a complicated math course in secondary college, which many keep away from in favor of a mathematical literacy course, Chireka mentioned.
Assist college students achieve real-world accounting experiences. Providing experiential studying may help entice college students and encourage them to stay with accounting. Temple college students can take part in its volunteer revenue tax help program for credit score, serving to households file their returns.
Schaum recommends that college members keep in contact with alumni within the subject who may be capable to function visitor audio system or supply internship alternatives for college kids. Gordon and Dawkins mentioned that college students need careers that contain problem-solving and creativity. Exposing college students to actual accounting work can broaden their understanding of the business.
Graduates of four-year U.S. accounting packages have an opportunity to achieve hands-on expertise and mentorship in finance jobs, earn a paycheck, and pursue a Chartered International Administration Accountant (CGMA) designation. AICPA & CIMA launched the apprenticeship program in 2022.
Tackle what’s vital to college students. Final 12 months the theme for Temple’s accounting program was “a occupation with a function.” One other 12 months it was “accounting as know-how.” It is vital to spotlight the points of the business that excite college students, Gordon mentioned. She famous that accounting is a brilliant main for college kids who wish to develop into entrepreneurs, an element that additionally attracts South African college students to the sphere, Chireka mentioned. Highlighting this good thing about the foremost might communicate to in the present day’s college students.
It may also be useful to develop initiatives together with your scholar inhabitants in thoughts. The vast majority of College of North Florida accounting college students work via college. The college affords a Supplemental Instruction program that enables Dawkins and his colleagues to rent profitable intermediate accounting college students as tutors to assist future cohorts. They earn cash to advance their research and deepen their connection to accounting.
Work with accounting corporations. For college accounting packages to achieve success they need to train college students the talents accountants will want in observe, Dawkins mentioned. One of the best ways to know what corporations are in search of is to keep up relationships with them. Chireka agrees that it will profit the occupation in South Africa to have extra corporations and associations on campuses.
KPMG affords a wide range of instruments out there to school together with Profession Catalyst for audit and tax, which gives sensible digital auditing expertise. The agency additionally affords packages like CPA Kickstart, which permits latest graduates to affix the agency early and obtain monetary assist whereas they research for the CPA Examination as a cohort. If college members learn about packages like these, they will promote them amongst college students who could also be weighing accounting in opposition to different fields.
— Megan Hart is a contract author primarily based in Florida. To touch upon this text or to counsel an concept for one more article, contact Courtney Vien at Courtney.Vien@aicpa-cima.com.
