Can an Introductory Accounting Course Help Students Successfully Complete a Financial Accounting Course?

Abstract

Some college students find themselves failing required courses. These course failures were a problem at a regional south-central United States (U.S.) university where many students were failing a required Financial Accounting course. Barriers to enrolling in the Financial Accounting course only included a sophomore standing, so it was possible for students with non-existent or limited accounting knowledge to enroll. To reduce the number of student failures in the Financial Accounting course administrators created numerous help programs including an Introductory Accounting course. This study focuses on the effectiveness of using an elective Introductory Accounting course to help business students complete a required financial accounting course, successfully. The effectiveness was determined by comparing students’ performance in Financial Accounting after taking the Introductory Accounting course (Experimental Group) with students that only took the Financial Accounting course (Control Group). Research data came from 471 students in the experimental group and the1388 in the control group. Unfortunately, the analysis produced results that suggested the Introductory Accounting course did not help students in Financial Accounting.