Introduction to Advanced Cases in Assurance Services

This class will serve as an introduction to ACCTG 521, Data Analytics for Professional Accountants. Advanced Cases in Assurance Services (ACCTG 521) is a required course in the MPAcc and concentrates on the study of the analytical mindset through data-driven case studies in audit and assurance practices. Students will also enhance their adaptability and resilience mindset by examining different assurance settings and questions, using multiple software packages, and incorporating multiple data types and quality. Students will work in teams and communicate questions and conclusions drawn from data analytics, using verbal communication, written communication, and data visualization. Students will use the questioning and innovation mindsets when identifying the underlying purpose of assurance related services, areas for judgment, and areas of opportunity for integrating data analytics and other emerging technology. The skills and tools from Data Analytics for Professional Accountants (ACCTG 522) will provide a foundation for data exercises in this class.

Why is this important?

This class is important as it will set the expectations and the framework used in ACCTG 521. Specifically, by introducing students to the Analytical Mindset and Skillset we will use to build students' Analytical abilities. The class will be part theoretical and part practical, the practical component making use of the Foster Remote Labs.

Materials:

Case: Economics of Audit Case
Slides: will be available for download by the beginning of class in either powerpoint or pdf formats.
Data: A data update may be required for this class. To ensure your files are the most up-to-date, navigate to ACCTG521_Labs folder and run the command git pull.
Analytics Tools: Git and GitHub

Review and Extension:

Building on the material covered in other MPAcc courses, this class will be part theoretical and part practical, the practical component making use of the Foster Remote Labs.

Preparation:

1. Students should read through the syllabus prior to class.
2. The material in this case and in Class 3 are based on the Economics of Audit Case students can read this material either before this class or class 3.
3. All data required for this class is available on the class GitHub page, students are encouraged to clone a copy to their remote labs U: drive.

Class Plan:

Teams: during this class, please sit in your discussion teams.

1. We will have a walk through of this website with Q&As We will start with the syllabus to familiarize everyone with the course content and requirements.
2. We will download all the data for 521 using Git by cloning the ACCTG521_Labs repository on my Github page.
3. Our main class activity will be a research-based case using qualitative analysis. Each Discussion group will be assigned a private company and will identify one additional private company (per discussion group) in Washington State from the data provided in this case.
4. We will also examine data in pitchbook requires a UW SSO login and the data in an older Tableau workbook from the github repo.