Mgt Accounting at EC

[MISin08]

Here's a review of ACC212 Managerial Accounting at Excelsior College. Managerial Accounting is a required topic for business majors at EC and there is currently no exam to cover it.

I enrolled in EC using the POAG partnership option (there are threads about this) so I am committed to take 12 credits through EC. I figured, I give up the option to test out of two classes (Business Policy I have to take at EC, and Mgt Accounting I have to take somewhere) and I get back a discount on fees. Since I have tuition reimbursement it's a good deal, even though it pushes back graduation a bit. In the past, I have taken courses online at my CC and Chadron State College.

The level of the material is beyond introductory accounting. We cover two book chapters per week. I wouldn’t call it hard, say, like calculus-based Physics, where a subject most people fail on the first try is a prerequisite. However, I find I have to be well-rested and relaxed to do well at quantitative work, and a lot of the concepts in the class were new to me. This (combined with the fact that I did ALEKS Pre-Algebra during the first month of the class) made the 8-week term pretty grueling. I've said it before: I would not try to do a brand-new subject in an 8-week term.

The quizzes (70% of grade): open book, but you have to know the material to do the work within the time limit. Each quiz is 10 questions covering the week's chapters. The problems are written so they build on previous learning. We learn about contribution margin in week 2, then week 4's quiz where we learn a concept that draws on contribution margin may require you to calculate the contribution margin as part of solving a quiz problem.

The discussions: you need to be on top of the material to do well on these and they are cumulatively 10% of the grade. A and B students will need to focus on these. Some weeks we have 4 questions to discuss; most of them are from the chapter review section. Some of the questions required us to read ahead in the book. Anyone who looks at Excelsior's liberal credit policies and assumes their classes are going to be low-ball has a surprise coming. You'll need the knowledge from the Financial Accounting exam, too. Other students in my class didn't participate to the level the instructor requests in the syllabus, nor to the level the instructors at Chadron insist upon. I try to do a good job on the discussions, so this frustrated me a bit.

The case problem (20% of grade): one of the chapter problems from the book. You fill out a spreadsheet of a fictitious business's budgets and income statement, using information given in the book. I thought this was a gimme, but I guess if you weren't paying attention in the first half of the term, you might have trouble with it.

The book (Garrison) is good and easy to work with. The class follows the book, nothing extra, so if you review the linked site, you'll know the class coverage. As an aside, Chadron uses the same book in their MBA accounting class. Accounting is a discipline you have to spend some time doing to learn, and the book's end-of chapter exercises are good for that. In fact Accounting differs in my experience from other subjects in that the end-of-chapter exercises are important to your success. The book's website is OK -- it has quizzes and practice exams, nothing special beyond that (by contrast, the site I used for financial acct CLEP has a nice tutorial on the accounting cycle). They have audio lectures for iPod, and powerpoints for each chapter. The course site posts these and Dr. Pope recommends viewing them twice (she also recommends spending 7-10 days per chapter).
So how is the EC online course experience? Overall, I'm satisfied, though I hope for a little more from the instructor when I get to senior-level courses in a couple months. Dr. Pope is fair. She wants us to learn and succeed. One question I got wrong because I fat-fingered the button on the screen, she gave me credit for. She allowed me to re-take a quiz I bombed because I didn’t feel well. She has a baby, so she can be a little slow to respond, but it didn't imperil my learning. Chadron State spoiled me with grades available rapidly after the end of term, this class is taking a little longer. I'm anticipating an A. EC uses Blackboard, which I'm used to and is more straightforward than eCollege as used at Chadron.

Phillip