11-25-2021, 10:39 PM
(11-25-2021, 07:29 PM)lidel Wrote: Side question from an over-excited nerd.Everything you need in terms of materials is either built into the course or (in a few cases) will be provided to you. When I took government and non-profit, for instance, there was not a course in the YourPace system. I was given some textbook chapters (in PDF format), some other materials (PDF or Word format), and the assignments. I had some email exchanges with the professor, prepare my assignments and emailed them to the Prof, and that was that.
I've been accepted, and I know my courses and still have two months until the start date. I've been doing some independent studies for learning and brushing up on things and was wondering if it would be worthwhile to dig up the textbooks for the courses I will be taking and begin a little reading in advance.
I figured I would ask first before giving this a go as I imagine that the textbooks are rather lengthy and I could potentially end up reading scads of stuff that won't even be covered in the courses. If this is the case I'll just try to chill out but I thought there would be no harm in asking some of the previous and current alumni how textbook-dependent the YourPace system is.
As always, thanks for any input!!
S
Assuming you got a pretty decent grounding in accounting in your prior classes, you should be fine. Based on the courses I think you have left (considering your original post), most of the courses are not terribly reliant on your other accounting classes. Auditing was mostly about auditing procedures. Tax is really about learning tax law and being able to prepare tax forms. Government and non-profit is about being about to prepare financial statements for those entities—it is the class that is the most like what you are used to, but I don’t think it’s super reliant on your prior accounting classes.
If it were me, there are 3 things I might consider:
1. Learning a little about finance. I really liked finance. I am seriously considering getting a master’s degree in finance, but financial management was hard. My lowest grade at UMPI was in financial management. It wasn’t impossible or anything, but it was challenging. I wish I had had a bit of understanding of the subject matter before jumping off into it.
2. Learning a little about US taxation. If you aren’t familiar with taxation of individuals (tax I at UMPI) or for-profit entities (tax II at UMPI— forms 1120, 1120S and 1065), it wouldn’t be a bad idea to learn a little. I am sure you would be fine without doing prior work, but it’s just different than what you are learning in other accounting classes and I could see somebody getting bogged down in the tax classes.
3. Learning a little about governmental accounting. State and local governments following GAAP prepare two sets of financial statements. At least when I took it, I had to prepare financial statements as a major part of the final project. It was hard just because, at least to my brain, it was so different than “regular”
accounting (for for-profit businesses).
In the case of government and non-profit accounting, I actually took a couple of days during the UMPI term and watched probably 5-10 hours of YouTube videos about fund accounting. It helped a lot and I could have done this when i wasn’t “wasting” my UMPI time.
FWIW, I had prepared taxes (one of my jobs) for a number of years before starting at UMPI, so tax was easy for me. Finance was fun but hard for me. Governmental accounting was painful for me, but I did well in it.
Best of luck!
Master of Accountancy (taxation concentration), University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, in progress.
Master of Business Administration (financial planning specialization), University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, in progress.
BA, UMPI. Accounting major; Business Administration major/Management & Leadership concentration. Awarded Dec. 2021.
In-person/B&M: BA (history, archaeology)
In-person/B&M: MA (American history)
Sophia: 15 courses (42hrs)
Master of Business Administration (financial planning specialization), University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, in progress.
BA, UMPI. Accounting major; Business Administration major/Management & Leadership concentration. Awarded Dec. 2021.
In-person/B&M: BA (history, archaeology)
In-person/B&M: MA (American history)
Sophia: 15 courses (42hrs)