Everything you wanted to know or should know about accounting

<p>none of the uc's have accounting as a major, a few offer only a minor in it. you sure i can't just get a master's in accounting? because some programs actually don't want you to have majored in undergrad accounting</p>

<p>I'm studying at nyu and planning on majoring in accounting and joining the 5 year masters/cpa program. I have about a 3.28 now, is there hope? I confident I can make myself seem good in an interview but will they give me a chance ?</p>

<p>taxguy- On a prior post (#236), I said NY was going to require completion of 150 credits to
take the CPA exam after Aug. 2009. Apparently they changed their mind. Now it has been proposed, and apparently will be the rule, that you can take the exam with 120 credits and finish the additional 30 credits after taking the exam. </p>

<p>Stay tuned, maybe it will change again!</p>

<p>I am taking Managerial Accounting and absolutely HATE it! Under these circumstances, will I be able to survive Intermediate Accounting I AND II (I actually did pretty well in Financial Accounting)?
Are there any “upper division” accounting classes similar to Managerial Accounting? Can I sit in the CPA exam without Cost Accounting?</p>

<p>(I am leaning to switch to marketing because I really love marketing. However, I am kind of worried about not finding a decent job with a marketing degree.)</p>

<p>Thanks! =)</p>

<p>wow, somehow I feel cool with my accountancy course and CAT degree lol</p>

<p>i hope business colleges will want me</p>

<p>Is it true that an accounting major can do what ever a finance major can do? In my school SUNY UB, they have a accounting degree with CPA track the other with Internal Auditing. Can the regular CPA track do what Internal Auditors do and the other way around?</p>

<p>As an accountant, do you interact with many people? what is their daily job like?</p>

<p>Is it safe to say you can get an accounting degree from any college and the starting salary won't be much of a difference...?</p>

<p>I have a problem.</p>

<p>I want to stay at this small downtown campus, but it is open enrollment and very easy to get into. The tuition is only 2k per month and the class sizes are usually small, which is good if you want to build a relationship with the professors(very crucial to me).</p>

<p>But the main campus cost around 6.5k per semester and the profs I hear focus more on research, large class sizes as well. but i bet the classes are harder as well.</p>

<p>I am doing accounting and I figured why not go to the smaller campus and pay less?</p>

<p>Now the only problem I can think of is if I want to do grad school, then not sure how an open enrollment university would look...</p>

<p>I recently received an audit internship offer at PwC and my recruiter is giving me the option to switch to SPA (PwC's equivalent of Deloitte's control assurance, KPMG's IT advisory). I was hoping someone could give me some insight as to which would be a better choice in terms of compensation and future career opportunities. </p>

<p>I would enjoy SPA because I like how it seems to combine an auditing and advisory together, but I worry that it would present less opportunities as it might lead me toward more of an IT track. </p>

<p>For audit, I would find the skills gained to be incredibly valuable and applicable to any future career endeavors in business, but I worry about its more unpredictable work hours and that I hear many more horror stories out of audit than any other service line.</p>

<p>Thanks so much for the input.</p>

<p>SPA doesn't include audit and advisory. SPA is simply auditing the IT systems. You check to see if they are running correctly, right numbers being generated, and so on. So, it's really the IT part of the audit (a crucial part, without it, the auditors can't do anything since the numbers rely on the computer systems working correctly).</p>

<p>But, I know people who worked with SPA and it's not a mix with advisory, but with IT.</p>

<p>I'd say, unless you enjoy the IT side of things, to stick with assurance.</p>

<p>Im a senior in high school and I'm very interested in accounting. I took a accounting class soph year and instantly fell in love with this. I love the kind of work it brings and would like to continue this in college. However with how hard the courses are sounding i dont know if i'm up to the challenge. What skills are most vital for succeeding in college? also what makes accounting most challenging?</p>

<p>It's been a long time since I get my degree in accounting (back when the Big Four were the Big Eight), but unless things have changed one of the nice things about an accounting major was that you needed enough credits in business courses outside of accounting, and there was a lot of similarity in non-major requirements, such that it was not difficult to pick up another business major. I had majors in accounting, economics and finance and still graduated within 4 years (although I did carry extra credits in several semesters). I ended up going to law school so I never worked as an accountant, but the ability to read and understand financial statements served me well in corporate and real estate law, and after 16 years of practicing big firm law I moved onto the business side and actually used my finance degree. My accounting background was even more valuable there. So even if you never get your CPA or work as an accountant, I'd say that accounting is a great major.</p>

<p>Can anyone in here tell me what kind of credentials are needed to get an interview in TS at a Big4? Is that also mainly for accounting majors?</p>

<p>I also have a similar question, is it true that to get an internship with a Big 4 firm in NYC over the summer you have to be in an ivy/target school?</p>

<p>I have a question that was not really answered previously. I wanna get a book that will give me a base knowledge of accounting before i enter college, i did the high school accounting, whats a good "intro to accounting" book that is available to me? Thank you</p>

<p>Bloomsm301, go to your local college or community college. ASk the bookstore clerk for their text books for "Intermediate Accounting."</p>

<p>High school accounting texts are generally written at a level lower than the standard financial accounting text used in the sophomore level financial accounting courses (typical first course in accounting for transfer students). I would recommend that you acquire a Financial Accounting text, rather than an intermediate text. I currently use the Wild text from McGraw-Hilll (4e), but also like the Harrison/Horngren text from Prentice Hall. Two other popular books are Needles (Houghton Mifflin) and Warren/Reeve/Duchac from South-Western (now Cengage). They all contain essentially the same material, so you might want to shop on price at amazon.com or half.com.</p>

<p>Thank you, and that will give me a base knowledge of what im getting into before my first college class next fall?</p>

<p>While a high school class in accounting gives you a basic background prior to your first college experience, it is by no means a prerequisite to have had a high school class or base knowledge of the subject. That is what the financial accounting class is designed to do - give you the base knowledge you will need to progress through your accounting studies. Once you have acquired foundation knowledge of what is covered in the introductory classes (first financial, then managerial), you'll revisit and build on those classes in intermediate accounting (generally two semesters, but sometimes three at some schools now) and cost accounting.</p>

<p>Bloomsm301, Unless you have a good amount of AP credits, don't expect that you will be taking any accounting classes your first year of college...or for that matter any business classes.
Business schools usually require you to take general classes (math, science, english, etc.) your first year of college. Then you move on to general business classes (management, econ, etc) your second year. Then usually you start your major classes your third year.</p>

<p>I am assuming you know this already. But keep an open mind about all business majors and don't just limit yourself to one just because you liked it at a HIGH SCHOOL level.</p>

<p>sp1212, as you have mentioned, having AP credits can make all the difference in how quickly you can dive into the accounting curriculum. DS, who had three years of accounting in high school, is now in his third semester of college and taking his third accounting course, thanks to his AP credits.</p>