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Improving accounting students' academic performance, especially in technical areas of accounting and associated business disciplines is a top priority in accounting education. A key, but often overlooked, skill that is essential to academic success is reading ability. In fact, reading ability has long been recognized to lie at heart of good technical communications. Faculty members at a regional university administered Nelson-Denny Reading Test to 235 accounting students and found a statistically significant correlation between their cumulative grade point averages (GPAs) and reading comprehension and vocabulary test scores. Based on this evidence, faculty examined reading comprehension-enhancement strategies that can be incorporated into teaching of accounting. These procedures are described in this paper. Many studies have emphasized importance of communications skills within accounting curriculum. In business and accounting journals, most literacy-based discussions have focused primarily on accounting students' written and oral communications skills. Maupin and May (1993) note, for example, that the importance of communications skills to successful practice of accounting has long been recognized. As long ago as 1968 American Accounting Association (AAA) made this strong statement: `Probably no other quality is more important--to an accountant--than having ability to communicate well both in writing and orally' (AAA, 1968). Maupin and May further noted that in 1990 American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) decided to test for writing skills on CPA exam. Although developing viable oral and written communications skills for those entering accounting profession has received attention (Rebele, 1985; Bushong, 1993), little notice has been paid to assessing reading skills which underlie effective communication. When it is recognized that reading is one aspect of language continuum and also involves development of speaking and writing ability, it is obvious that better business literacy cannot be fostered without serious attention to reading. Students who read well generally show themselves to be organized thinkers who comprehend what needs to be said, connect thoughts logically, examine importance or meaning behind things, and are more likely to demonstrate empathy or seeing-the-other-person's-point-of-view upon which sound relationships are built. Regardless of type of information you may be trying to compile in business, if you do not know target group's reading ability, Your data isn't (sic) valid. (Keller, 1991). Recognizing importance of reading to successful communications within accounting profession, a group of professors at a regional state university asked students enrolled in Managerial Accounting (Principles of Accounting II), Intermediate Accounting II, and Advanced Accounting II classes to take Nelson-Denny Reading Test (NDRT). The professors' goal was to examine relationship between students' overall success in college as measured by their cumulative GPAs and their reading ability. Two hundred thirty-five students (131 females and 104 males) participated in study during spring semester 1997. Research Design and Results The NDRT measures reading comprehension, reading vocabulary and reading rate. It was chosen primarily because of its wide acceptability over many years of use, its recent standardization on relevant populations (high school students, and students from two-year and four-year colleges), and its minimization of gender and ethnic bias. The test scores were analyzed using Chi-square, Pearson correlation coefficients and linear regression. The research indicates statistically significant relationships measures of students' reading comprehension, reading vocabulary, and calculated reading grade equivalent (a combined measure of reading comprehension and vocabulary) and their cumulative GPAs. …
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