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Introduction
The Bachelor of Commerce – Professional Accounting is a three-year undergraduate degree at Macquarie University. The capstone unit, ACCG 399: Accounting in Context, is undertaken in the final year of study and provides students with the opportunity to integrate and advance their knowledge of accounting techniques and processes covered in prior learning. The capstone represents a culmination of a student’s learning and acts as a crowning point in the degree programme.

To prepare students for a complex and rapidly changing professional business environment, students are provided opportunities throughout the capstone to develop a reflective and critical stance, so that they are able to learn from their experiences and adapt to new challenges they may be presented with.

The capstone enables a space where students can reflect on prior learning, current progress and development and how these integrate to acquire new understandings within their learning experience. Learners are provided the opportunity to creatively explore their learning, through the accumulation of artifacts used within their learning. A heightened contextual awareness can develop through reflective practice, uncovering contradictions in prior reasoning and opening alternative ideas as experiences are reflected upon. The capstone unit therefore provides the essential space in which an individual can experience thinking, seeing and living as an accountant.

By placing an emphasis on accounting within the profession, the self and society, the capstone opens up the curricula, expanding learner conceptions of accounting beyond their immediate academic environment to ensure students develop a broader contextual appreciation of their discipline. Through the provision of varied learning resources students are able to construct artifacts that provide a cultural/social, political, ethical, professional and personal contextual appreciation of accounting.

The capstone therefore aims to provide a holistic perspective to students learning. Removing students from their norm – provoking them, inducing their creativity and embracing their imagination. In doing so, it provides students an opportunity to visualise accounting in different ways and facilitates the integration of their learning across their degree program.

Delivery format
The Capstone is delivered twice a year, over a 13-week semester, with an average student cohort of between 600-700. Weekly lectures on topical issues in accounting provide students the opportunity to critically evaluate accounting information and accounting standards through an understanding of both context and the different theoretical and philosophical approaches to accounting that have evolved over time. This enables students to integrate and advance their knowledge of accounting techniques and processes covered in previous courses.

The capstone has been designed around a three-stage learning cycle that replaces a more ‘traditional’ tutorial programme, commonly found in accounting courses. The three-stage learning cycle is built upon the notion of ‘Think-Act-Reflect’ – where the learning environment has been re-envisioned for the student. This is represented in Figure 1. below:

Figure 1: Redesigned capstone learning approach

During the ‘think’ phase a student is required to engage in a pre-thought activity prior to attending their tutorial. An illustrative example is where a student is asked to reflect back on their overall learning experience in accounting, thinking about the meaning of accounting, accountability and an accountant and engage in a reflective pre-discussion thought activity with the assistance of probing questions. These questions include, for example, ‘what is it that you perceive, see, feel and think about each of these three concepts?’ ‘What have you learned up until this point?’ ‘Can you describe some of the things you have enjoyed?’ ‘Can you describe some of the things you have found difficult, struggled with or were just really confusing?’ ‘Why you have struggled with these aspects and how they made you feel?’ ‘Things that you would still like to discover?’ ‘How you might approach your learning in accounting differently in the future?’

Students then attend a tutorial during the ‘act’ phase where they engage in both individual and group activities and discussion. Continuing the above illustrative example, students engage in the creation of a photographic image collage, constructed from students conceptions of accounting and their relation to images located within various lifestyle magazines. Student collages are then discussed in small groups and through a tutor-facilitated discussion relating to an accounting context. Students are encouraged at this point to discuss as a group key points and images raised and whether this is how they had viewed accounting, accountability and an accountant, or not!

The final phase, requires students to ‘reflect’ where they engage in a post-thought activity requiring them to synthesis their learning and express areas for further development. This is then captured through the writing up of activities, discussion and captured artifacts. For the illustrative example above, students are required to create a consensus across their reflections and peer discussions focused around key questions to assist thought and further reflection. These questions include, ‘how did you find your experience of this tutorial activity, in general?’ ‘How did it make you feel when completing this activity?’ ‘Can you describe how you visualised accounting, based on the images you sourced?’ ‘Looking back on your written description outlined in your Thought Activity and think about this in comparison with your collage image. Has your perspective changed or developed in any way since then, if so can you describe this?’
 
Feedback and assessment
The capstone is assessed through a comprehensive professional portfolio of work, critical discussion posts and a case study designed around the ethical and societal impact of accounting. Portfolio design has not previously been incorporated within the Faculty of Business and Economics at Macquarie University and marks the inaugural use of such a learning and assessment resource design within accounting.

The portfolio is implemented within the capstone as a substantive piece of assessment, replacing the ‘traditional’ examination and constituting 60% of assessed work. Additional assessment items include the case study (20%) and critical discussion forum activity (20%). The Comprehensive Professional Portfolio of work currently has a paper-based design, with learning and assessment delivered through 10 of a 13-week semester.

Graduate attributes built into the portfolio include:
• Critical, Analytical and Integrative Thinking
• Problem Solving and Research Capability
• Socially and Environmentally Active and Responsible
• Capable of Professional and Personal Judgement and Initiative

The three-stage learning cycle – described under the delivery format section above – is consistently reinforced through each of the 10 portfolio activities, peer-based discussion and personal reflection, as illustrated in the schedule of learning below.

The portfolio is worth 60% of a students overall grade and this is comprised of the following elements: completion of work (18%), participation covering the areas of peer interaction, preparation, participation, contribution to class and group dynamic (12%) and content covering the areas of contextual appreciation and awareness of assumptions, developing own perspective or position, supporting data/evidence, developing personal understanding and thought throughout portfolio and quality of writing and communication (30%). Marking rubric exemplars that show alignment of learning outcomes to assessed portfolio work are available on request from the academics involved (Please see contact details above).

Resourcing
The capstone design and implementation was conducted by two full-time academics in the Department of Accounting and Corporate Governance at Macquarie University. The unit did not attract any external funding resources and was constructed under normal operating budgets. Student learning time remained unchanged from usual formats. Casual staff employed to teach the capstone were paid to attend additional planning and training sessions. Staff induction sessions have been maintained subsequent to the initial trialing to ensure open communication between staff and the success of the portfolio assessment.

Outcomes
The capstone unit and portfolio of work is firmly grounded in reflective practice engaging students in conceptual and creative experimentation within an often technically driven discipline. Most importantly, this approach has enabled student learning to become integrated, flexible and personal. It has allowed academic staff in accounting to embrace creative means of pedagogical design with the student in mind. This means learning has become contextually driven and perhaps more importantly this is done, by the student themselves. Portfolios have provided a visually arresting means for individuals to explore their discipline within a social, political, commercial and ethical context. By using varying forms of expression and creativity it has created a non-threatening environment for students to engage, ensuring a way for international students to express themselves that may otherwise not have been possible. This has created a learning experience that provides a student an opportunity to

• Develop a design mindset
• Curate and communicate for an audience
• Integrate their learning
• Explore rich contextual appreciation
• Develop their curiosity
• Extend their reflective and sense-making ability

Student comments on the capstone
“It allowed us to think about accounting as an organic thing that is ever-changing and something which can impact rather than a static being with which we must conform. I truly believe it affected me as a learner and as a person”
“It’s the first time someone has shown me the true impact accountants have on society, and I am so grateful for that. This has been brilliant in bringing a whole new dimension to our accounting studies”
“My perceptions of accounting were changed as I saw just how many pictures alone related to accounting. In a way, I felt empowered by this”
“I don’t think such ‘value’ has been unlocked from an assessment by myself previously”
“It was the most interesting, controversial and useful subject I have ever done”

Related material/resources

Website
Video Resource

Research

Sin, S., and McGuigan, N. (2013). Fit for Purpose: A framework for developing and assessing complex graduate attributes in a changing higher education environment. Accounting Education: An international Journal, 22(6), pp. 522-543.

McGuigan, N. and Kern, T. (2015). Developing a Creative Environment for Learning: Nurturing Reflective though Amongst Accountants. In Coleman, K. S. and Flood,A. (Eds) Capturing Creativity: The Link between Creativity and Teaching Creatively, illinois, USA: Common Ground Publishing LLC, pp. 145-167

McGuigan, N. and Kern, T. (2013). A Road Towards Enhanced Corporate Governance: (Re)conceptualizing the Accounting Profession through an Integrated Educational Framework. In Hellman, A. (Ed.) Behavioral Accounting. New York: Nova Publishers, pp. 85-96.

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Key characteristics
Final Year Undergraduate Capstone, Multiple Semester Unit, Portfolio design, Integrated learning, Critical and Reflective practice, Accounting Education
Student numbers: 500+

 

Contact
Nick McGuigan, Senior Lecturer, Department of Accounting and Corporate Governance [email_link email=”nicholas.mcguigan@gmail.com”]Email Nick[/email_link]
Thomas Kern, Associate Lecturer, Department of Accounting and Corporate Governance [email_link email=”thomas.kern@thomaskern.net”]Email Thomas[/email_link]

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