School of Accountancy Research Publications
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Item Tax return analysis in fraud examination: the case of the Bankruptcy Auditor(American Accounting Association, 2020-09-04) Quirin, Jeffrey J.; O'Bryan, David; Goedeke, Mary JoThe tax return is often a key piece of evidence in a forensic accounting engagement. Forensic accounting students need to understand what a tax return can tell its reader about the taxpayer. This case is designed for an introductory or advanced course in fraud examination or forensic accounting. Students are placed in the hypothetical role of a person beginning a job as a bankruptcy auditor with the United States Trustee Program. The bankruptcy auditor must utilize two consecutive years of tax returns to determine the primary sources of income and assets for the debtor. Information from the tax returns will be compared to the bankruptcy petition to identify red flags that could indicate the debtor has committed fraud or abuse of the bankruptcy process. Successful completion of this case requires students to integrate skills from auditing, taxation, business law, and forensic accounting and communicate findings in a written report.Item Mom's money is missing: bank records analysis in a fraud examination case(American Accounting Association, 2020-10-13) Quirin, Jefferey J.; O'Bryan, DavidBank records analysis is a vital component of many forensic accounting and fraud examination engagements. This case provides students with a hands-on opportunity to conduct a fraud examination based upon a detailed review of bank records. The context of this case is an elderly client who has appointed her son as her durable power of attorney. Unfortunately, he violates his fiduciary duty and misappropriates money from his mother. The students' assignment is to trace the missing money through numerous bank accounts and prepare a report for the local county attorney who will prosecute the case. Students will learn how to trace money through multiple bank accounts, prepare a succinct report for the prosecutor, cope with a large quantity of source documents, and manage a relatively unstructured task.Item The effect of increases in board independence on financial reporting quality(Emerald Publishing, 2023-04-25) Porter, Christine M.; Sherwood, MatthewPurpose: This paper aims to examine the relation between SEC regulations centered on board of director independence and financial reporting quality and investigates the different routes to board independence. Design/methodology/approach: The sample includes 1,248 firm observations whose board composition is compared between 2001 and 2008. Each firm is categorized based on how they increase board independence. The authors test the hypotheses using ordinary least squares regression models. Findings: Results show that firms choose between multiple routes when complying with the independence requirements, and how firms operationalize the SEC requirement impacts financial reporting quality. Specifically, firms that achieve increased board independence through increased board size are associated with higher financial reporting quality. However, there is no association between higher financial reporting quality and a subsequent increase in audit fees. Suggesting the reporting quality results from the board monitoring function and not from an increase in auditor effort. Originality/value: No evidence exists on how a firm's chosen route to increased board independence relates to financial reporting quality.Item Adaptive scaffolding toward transdisciplinary collaboration: Reflective polyvocal self-study(Springer International Publishing, 2022-12-16) Alagic, Mara; Sclafani, Maria; Filbert, Nathan; Rimmington, Glyn M.; Demissie, Zelalem S.; Dutta, Atri; Bowen, Aaron; Lindsay, Ethan; Kuhlmann, Meghann; Rattani, Ajita; Rai, AtulContemporary global challenges require experts from various disciplines to work together. Since every field of knowledge has its unique language and discipline-based culture, collaborative inquiry presents an additional challenge during such collaboration. Ideally, collaborators from each discipline can transcend their respective linguistic and cultural boundaries to achieve transdisciplinarity, where this includes sharing and taking perspectives, active listening; and adaptive, relational metacognitive scaffolding. Within such a framework, the merging of ideas, theories, research design, and methodologies can allow technological applications from each discipline to be achieved through active collaborative, sense-making, and sustained constructivist relations. Within the context of the Disaster Resilience Analytics Center (DRAC) research team, we developed a model of adaptive scaffolding via self-consistent, iterative refinement. This convergence project focused on socio-economic aspects, outreach, and STEAM education, along with postgraduate education. The research team comprised researchers from STEAM disciplines in physical sciences, mathematics, computer sciences, social sciences, humanities, education, and library science. It proved essential to occasionally step away from the research topic and to critically co-reflect on the initial and ongoing challenges in the convergence path. This resulted in more constructive integration and transcendence of disciplines, leading to the development of an adaptive scaffolding framework. We present this framework and additional reflective insights and limitations related to its potential application in different contexts.Item Did friendship impair the auditor’s independence?(American Accounting Association, 2022-06-09) Sherwood, Matthew; Porter, Christine M.The objective of this case is to help students identify potential violations of independence between a member of an external financial statement audit team and a client employee. Additionally, this case informs students of the audit firm's responsibilities to identify and address independence violations should they arise. The concept of independence is often difficult for students without any practice-oriented exposure to grasp. The case, loosely based on an actual auditor-client situation, presents a situation an audit professional might encounter in the ordinary course of business to bring the concept of independence to life. Instructors can use this case to enhance their lecture and discussion of auditor independence, either as a graded assignment or a guide for an in-depth class discussion.