What do we mean by accounting program quality? A decomposition of accounting faculty opinions

• Published in: Journal of accounting education Vol. 36; pp. 16 - 42
• Main Authors: Fogarty, Timothy J., Zimmerman, Aleksandra B., Richardson, Vernon J.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Harrisonburg Elsevier Ltd 01.09.2016; Elsevier BV
• Subjects: Accounting; Accounting education; Accounting program quality; Accreditation; Business schools; Institutional reputation; PAR rankings; Perceptions; Quality of education; Reputations; Studies; Institutional reputation; PAR rankings; Accounting program quality; Accounting education
• ISSN: 0748-5751; 1873-1996
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jaccedu.2016.04.001

•This paper uses objective measures to study the subjective nature of accounting program quality.•Student success as measured by CPA pass rates and large international accounting firm partner achievement are highly correlated with program quality.•Faculty research productivity in top accounting journals is not highly correlated with program quality.•University business school halo and accounting program visibility are precursors to perceptions of accounting program quality.•Accreditation plays a role in program quality. Institutional quality has been, and will continue to be, an important dimension of academic accounting. How we measure it, by increasingly featuring objective output measures, has taken the construct away from demonstrated meaningfulness among its most important constituency. This paper forms several research propositions that attempt to identify the antecedents of perceived accounting program quality. Using accounting faculty judgments about accounting programs provided to a popular press request – the Public Accounting Report – the results show that an institution's educational success is more important than its research productivity. More general school characteristics, including the program's accreditation profile and the reputation of the business school in which the program is embedded, are also significant in their direct association with perceived program quality. These more remote factors also indirectly impact program reputation through their significant direct effect on educational outcomes. Implications for further research are drawn.