Why Don't Students Major in Accounting?

Abstract

In recent years numerous predictions have been made about the demise of the accounting profession. These scenarios normally mention declining accounting enrollments and accounting professionals bemoaning the skills of graduates. Professionals talk about the changing business environment and the need to revise the accounting curriculum. The most recently touted study is by W. Steve Albrecht and Robert J. Sack. In their study, they determined reasons why students were not majoring in accounting by surveying professors and practicing accountants. Perhaps if they had surveyed students, they might have drawn different conclusions. This article examines student perceptions to reveal other reasons for declining enrollment.BackgroundThe American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) has for many years polled schools and collected enrollment data from accounting departments. Their research has shown that enrollment has been declining significantly (AICPA, 2001). In 2000, Albrecht and Sack confirmed the AICPA enrollment data and analyzed the viewpoints of accounting professors and practitioners on problems facing the accounting profession. That study, Accounting Education: Charting the Course Through a Perilous Future, was conducted as a joint project of the American Accounting Association, American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, Institute of Management Accountants, and the Big Five accounting firms.Albrecht and Sack (20OO) enumerated several reasons why the quantity and quality of students choosing to major in accounting have decreased. Those reasons included starting salaries for accounting majors being lower than for other business majors, a lack of information and considerable misinformation about what accounting is and what accountants do, and the ISO-hours rule to become a GPA (Albrecht, 2000). The conclusions of Albrecht and Sack were derived from interviews and surveys of accounting professors and practicing accountants. This paper is based on results of a survey of a group ignored by Albrecht and Sack-the students.ParticipantsThe two participant groups for this study included accounting and non-accounting business majors at a growing university in southeast Georgia with a student population that exceeds 15,000. Even though it is located in rural Georgia, approximately 40 percent of the students come from the metropolitan Atlanta area. The rest of the students come predominantly from southeast Georgia, northern Florida, and South Carolina. One of the more diverse universities in the south, the university's student body is approximately 71 percent white and 24 percent black. The student body is 53 percent female and 47 percent male. The average SAT score for incoming freshman is 1052, which exceeds the national average. (Georgia Southern, 2002)The first group of students surveyed, the accounting majors, totaled 65 including 31 graduate students, 31 seniors, two juniors and one student who failed to respond. The second group, the nonaccounting business students, totaled 48. That group consisted of one graduate student, 41 seniors, and six juniors. The distribution of majors for the non-accounting group was seven in finance/economics, 33 in marketing/ management, six in informa-tion systems/logistics, and two students with double majors. Accounting had more graduate students since the state requires students to accumulate 150 hours before taking the CPA exam.Results and DiscussionsIn an effort to answer the question Why don't students major in accounting, two questions were considered. First, Why do students choose not to major in accounting? second, What causes students to select accounting as a major?The reasons given in the Albrecht and Sack for students not majoring in accounting were(1) starting salaries for accounting majors are lower than for other business majors;(2) students today have more attractive career alternatives than in the past;(3) students today are more willing to choose risky majors than they were in the past;(4) a lack of information and considerable misinformation about what accounting is and what accountants do; and(5) the 150-hours rule has increased the opportunity costs to become a GPA and prospective students perceive 150-hour programs as being too narrow and non-value added (Albrecht, 2000). …

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