The Current State of Ethics Education in Accounting Programs

Ethics plays a critical role in the accounting profession. Accountants are expected to uphold high standards of competence and integrity to protect and garner public trust. Past accounting scandals illustrate the gap between ideal ethical standards and those in practice in the profession, and the need for an ethics course in the accounting curriculum. Historically, ethics has been integrated as part of existing courses, but research suggests that a stand-alone ethics course can help to develop ethical reasoning skills; and, therefore, provide more value to students. Previously, universities cited lack of room in the curriculum as a barrier to including a separate ethics course. This problem has been alleviated with the current CPA education requirement of 150 hours in most states. This study extends the accounting ethics literature by providing an update on the level of ethics coverage in graduate accounting programs in U.S. AACSB accredited schools. We research whether ethics is considered an important learning outcome in programs, and if stand-alone ethics courses, required or elective, have been implemented at the graduate level for CPA candidates. We find that over 50% of the colleges in the study have a stand-alone ethics course. While this represents an increase in the level of ethics coverage in graduate level programs, there is still an ongoing need to increase ethics education in accounting programs in order to protect the future credibility of the accounting profession.