Accounting school gets an ethics makeover: while accredited professionals naturally keep up in their fields, the new legislation is driving many to hone their ethics skills and knowledge as well.

• Author: Karr, Susan Schott
• Position: Accounting Education

If recent corporate scandals have cast a shadow on the reputation of the accounting profession, Sarbanes-Oxley has rattled the industry's cage by calling for reforms in financial reporting, corporate governance and auditing. The effects are far-reaching for all who are involved in and with the accounting profession--accountants in public and private practice, internal and external auditors, students of accounting and accounting educators, among others.

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With this sea change comes the need for all parties to hone their educational skills and knowledge. As a result, many people with ties to the field, both in academia and practice, are heading back to school.

Taking to the Books: In Academia

As the weather heats up this July, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP (PwC) will be conducting in-house training--for accounting professors. Its University for Faculty expects to have more than 300 accounting professors from over 200 colleges convene for four days of learning and the chance to network with each other and PwC partners. Although corporate training is not new, what is new is the material to be addressed and its pressing importance.

Brent Inman, partner in charge of U.S. recruiting at PwC, says, "This is a unique time in our profession and the business world, an important time to give faculty updates on current developments." PwC's training comes in part as a response to Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which pertains to internal controls. The training will address more than just accounting; the faculty will also study ethics. The two are intertwined, he says.

The challenge to the accounting professor, Inman explains, is to integrate the teaching of ethics and professionalism in accounting across the broad spectrum of courses so that students develop abilities related to moral reasoning and ethical decision-making, and develop safeguards for preventing unethical behavior. Professors need to learn how to meet the needs of students so that they, in turn, will later meet the needs of the accounting profession. Sarbanes-Oxley has brought to the forefront the importance of ethical behavior in the practice of accounting, and the PwC courses relate accounting to today's real-world experience.

Stephen Loeb, Ph.D., an accounting and finance faculty member at the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland and a member of the American Accounting Association's (AAA) Professionalism and Ethics Committee, is heavily involved...