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The primary aim of the Annual Report Project (ARP) is to encourage FSB students to extend and apply the accounting concepts learned in the classroom and from the textbook to a "live" annual report. The ARP offers students hands-on practice in deciphering accounting terminology as it differs from company to company, as well as practice in recognizing the various presentation formats that are common in external financial statements. By the end of the semester, ACC 221 students are able to read and analyze accounting reports to determine the company's major financial strengths and weaknesses revealed by those reports. Additionally, students gain an appreciation for the impact that financial information has on resource allocation decisions among and between economic organizations. As a team-oriented project, the ARP also offers valuable development of students' teamwork skills, which are understood both inside and outside the university setting as an indispensable component for success in today's corporate environment.

The ARP is organized around a semester-long series of assignments in which the students are matched up with a single firm, obtain that firm's annual report, SEC 10-K, and proxy statement, and then explore and analyze those financial documents in order to evaluate the firm's suitability as an investment opportunity. Of the fourteen assignments required by the ARP, four key assignments are memos.

The advantages to assigning these memos are numerous:

1. memo writing encourages students to practice a specific writing task that is frequently used in business contexts;
2. memo writing invites students to actively synthesize and integrate the separate accounting concepts learned in the classroom into one coherent report; and
3. memos that are collaboratively-written not only strengthen each student's individual understanding of course content, but also deepen his/her awareness of the value of teamwork as it operates in the corporate sphere.

The ARP, as it is designed and universally implemented by the Accountancy Department, is a flexible and effective project that provides students with combined theoretical and practical knowledge that is beneficial for subsequent coursework and desired by the companies who will hire Miami University graduates.

Speaking Rhetorically: What The ARP Does Well

Like all good rhetorical practice, the ARP defines its context for student writers by providing a general "scenario" of the writing situation:

You or your team are starting a firm to advise investors. A potential client has asked that you assist her in evaluating a company which she might add tto her investment portfolio. Also, based on the usefulness and quality of your memos and advice, she will determine whether or not to stay with your firm.

Situated within this defined rhetorical scenario, student writers not only have a clear sense of the overarching purpose of their task (i.e., to evaluate a company's suitability as an investment opportunity on the basis of its financial strengths and weaknesses) but also understand the potential consequences of financial accounting for their future as investment consultants (i.e., the usefulness and quality of their analysis as it is conveyed through memo writing determines both client satisfaction and their consulting firm's viability).

Focused writing tasks like memos provide a particularly useful way to analyze and integrate new knowledge . The four memo assignments are designed to synthesize the various key concepts presented in the course textbook, and offer students a sequentially ordered framework within which to organize their newly acquired accounting knowledge. The four (required) memo assignments include:

• Memo 1: An overall assessment of the company, including an initial reaction (favorable or unfavorable) based on the company's financial disclosure system (i.e., does the annual report and SEC filings (10-K and proxy) contain sufficient information to gain a working knowledge of the company?).
• Memo 2: An evaluation of the company's financial structure, including all financial activities such as debt/equity financing and primary transactions.
• Memo 3: An examination and reasoned explanation of the company's investing activities, focusing particularly on its current investment policies and culminating in a more precise assessment of the company's suitability for your client's portfolio.
• Memo 4: A recommendation for either the inclusion or exclusion of the company with regard to your client's portfolio. This recommendation integrates all of the financial information derived throughout the semester and included in the previous memos (i.e., the company's overall financing, investing, and operating activities).

The progressive sequencing of the four memo assignments encourages students to simultaneously practice two critical thinking skills—analysis and synthesis—within the context of writing. In other words, writing the ARP memos not only requires that students understand concepts and ideas as separate components, but also expects students to integrate these concepts into a business form that is written for a specific purpose (i.e., to assess, evaluate, explain, or recommend).

Speaking Locally: What the Students Had to Say

When asked to list the most effective aspects(s) of the ARP, FSB students responded:

• "[The ARP] gives relevance to the entire course."
• "Staying with one business throughout the entire term provides consistency and an opportunity to get a feel for why certain information is presented."
• "[The ARP] connects the 'abstract' with the 'practical.'"
• "Learning how to work as a team is crucial."
• "Hands-on experience is invaluable."

When asked how the ARP successfully integrates the concepts of financial accounting with business writing skills, FSB students replied:

• "[The ARP] increased my ability to understand business vocabulary in a practical way."
• "The ARP doesn't let you get away with one- or two-word answers. It makes you think through the concepts and then express your thoughts."
• "[The ARP] helps us understand how to use financial language in relation to business concepts."

Final Thoughts

• The results of the survey indicate that many ACC 221 students feel better prepared to write in business contexts as a direct result of completing the ARP.
• "Yes" answers outnumbered "No" answers by a margin of 2-to-1.
• Nearly half of the "No" answers were qualified by students indicating their need for more writing practice in business classes.
• One-third of the "Yes" answers reported that the most effective part of the ARP was the final memo assignment.

Special thanks go out to Dr. Clayton Hock for his encouraging support of this project, and to ACC 221 instructor Chris Metcalf without whose time, expertise and charitable assistance in the gathering of data this report could not have been written.

Last modified on 4/2/08 | Content maintained by HWI