ECO 710 Professor L. Tauber
Advanced Accounting Theory Spring 2004

 

This course meets with ECO 444. You are responsible for all of the material covered in this class. Your grade will be based on two non-cumulative, equally weighted examinations (a midterm and a final), as well as a research paper. As graduate students, your exams will be more rigorous than those of the undergraduates. The research paper will be 10% of your grade.

Research Paper:

Your paper should be 5 to 10 pages long. I expect that you will write a short paper covering the chosen material. I will not be impressed nor will I give you a higher grade for a long paper that contains little or no factual material. I will not be dazzled by presentation, only by content. Please familiarize yourself with the definition of plagiarism and Lehman’s policy on it. If you have questions about what constitutes plagiarism, please discuss them with me.

As accounting students, you are aware that in many corporations and their auditors have recently been criticized for their creative accounting procedures. Select a corporation that has been accused of violating GAAP accounting principles. Discuss the principles violated, the creative accounting procedures, and how these relate to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002.

By February 23rd, you must submit, in writing, the name of the corporation that you intend to research. Since I will not allow more than one person to write about each corporation, you might want to choose quickly in order to secure your first choice.

On March 29th you must hand in an outline of your paper or, if you prefer, a rough draft.

The final paper is due on May 17th.

If you have any questions concerning your paper or any of the deadlines or formats, please see me. Do not wait until the deadline to inquire about what was expected!

Warning: Each paper must be the solo effort of its author. If two papers bear a significant resemblance to each other, I will assume that they were a group effort. In that case, I will to lower both grades by 50%.