Admissions Information

The program is open to full-time and part-time students. Students are admitted in the Fall and Spring semesters. 

In addition to satisfying all Graduate Education requirements for the degree, all candidates for the master’s degree must satisfy the following departmental requirements:

1. A total of 30 hours of graduate-level coursework. 
2. No “D” grades can be counted in the completion of requirements for the degree.
3. Every student must pass a comprehensive assessment that will be based on the core requirements for the program pursued.

In addition to the graduate admissions requirements, MSA applicants need to provide two letters of recommendation from persons who can comment on the applicant's capability for graduate-level study. References from faculty members under whom the applicant has studied and employers are considered better references than character references. In addition, MSA applicants need to provide a resume.

In addition to meeting all the general requirements of Graduate Education and of the department as stated above, candidates for the master’s degree in accounting must satisfy the following requirements:

For admission into the MSA program, a student must have an undergraduate degree in accounting or related area, or approval of the department.

Course List

Code	Title	Hours
Required Courses
ATG 600	Professional Career Planning	3.0
ATG 601	Financial Accounting Research Application	3.0
ATG 657	Advanced Auditing	3.0
ATG 670	Advanced Data Analytics for Accounting	3.0
ATG 677	Tax Research	3.0
ATG 691	Financial Statement Analysis and Reporting	3.0
MIS 571	Applied Machine Learning for Business	3.0
MIS 573	Data Visualization for Business Analytics	3.0
ATG 698	Accounting Comprehensive Assessment	0.0
Elective
For choices, see the listing of 500 and 600-level courses in the Foster College of Business programs and obtain approval from the Graduate Program Director. 1		6.0
Total Hours		30

¹

with the exception of ATG 604 Controllership 

Comprehensive Examination

Each MSA program student must take a comprehensive examination. This examination covers the graduate work that the student is presenting for the degree. The time, place, and nature of the examination are a part of ATG 698 Accounting Comprehensive Assessment.

Foundation Courses

Individuals entering the MSA program with an accounting degree from a regionally accredited university will not be required to complete any foundation courses. Individuals entering the MSA program with a non-accounting business degree from a regionally accredited university will be required to complete only the accounting foundation courses. For all other individuals, transcripts will be reviewed to determine whether the individual has completed courses equivalent to the business and accounting foundation courses within the last 10 years, and any foundation class for which an equivalent has not been completed will be required. Equivalency will be determined for a foundation course using the undergraduate equivalency guides. All foundation courses must be completed with a grade of C or better.

Business foundation courses include:

• Accounting Principles – Financial 
• Accounting Principles – Managerial
• Legal Environment of Business
• Operations Management 
• Organizational Management
• Microeconomics 
• Macroeconomics
• Finance
• Marketing
• Quantitative Analysis 
• Management Information Systems

Accounting foundation courses include:

• Intermediate Accounting 
• Intermediate Accounting 
• Cost Accounting 
• Accounting Systems and Control
• Auditing 
• Federal Tax I

For descriptions and course numbers of the foundation courses, please see the undergraduate and graduate catalog course lists.