Construct a Two-Stage Case Study in an Intermediate Accounting II Course

Lei Wen, Emporia State University, Emporia, Kansas, USA

ABSTRACT

This study develops a two-stage case study in a face-to-face undergraduate intermediate accounting II course. A two-stage case study is specially designed for this course as a learning process to allow students to have individual work in the first stage. Then students experience teamwork or cooperative learning in the second stage. The research findings show that students are neutral about their experience of two-stage case study. The implementation of a two-stage case study makes students have a less positive view about the course, compared with their peers in a control group without a two-stage case study. One possible explanation could be lack of more meaningful interactive peer learning.

Keywords: Case Study, Accounting Education, Peer Learning, Cooperative Learning

X-treme Makeover . . . Over and Over Again

Cory Angert, University of Houston-Downtown, Texas, United States

ABSTRACT

When Microsoft Corporation, in 2013, announced several controversial restrictions for its Xbox One videogame entertainment console, the company ignited a maelstrom of backlash that placed the firm in a precarious position. Responding to the tumult, the company hurriedly reversed all of its intended plans. The BEIJ article “X-treme Makeover: A Case Study of Microsoft’s Dramatic Xbox 180 Strategy Reversal” (Angert, 2019) details the events of this industry-shaking strategic pivot. One might assume that the company had learned its lesson, yet nearly eight years later in 2021, Microsoft again announced extremely unpopular policies, only to be forced to immediately retract them. The present research updates the previous BEIJ article and includes new topics for discourse. This supplemental piece presents a brief recap of the 2013 events documented in the previous case study, a succinct account of the more-recent 2021 situation, and discussion questions intended to assist professors in facilitating student learning.

Keywords: strategic pivot, Microsoft, Xbox Live, Netflix

Teaching the Sampling Distribution of the Average

Kenneth Sutrick, Murray State University, Murray, Kentucky, USA

ABSTRACT

The most difficult topic for students to understand in elementary statistics is the sampling distribution of the sample average  and along with it the quantity  which is the standard deviation or standard error of .  Both appear in confidence intervals and test statistics, but with  being the mystery formula of elementary statistics. It is usually still a mystery even after it has been covered in class because it is such a tricky topic. Every time a student sees  in beginning statistics, they are probably thinking “I don’t understand”. The behavior of  is difficult because  is a random variable and it is hard at an elementary level to imagine and/or understand why  is random. In a class example,  is just a number sitting on a page not moving or changing and not looking at all random. At an elementary level it is often hard to picture the randomness in the data collecting mechanism that got you that . The mystery formula  measures the amount of variability and randomness in .  To understand this formula completely, one must go into the full mathematics used to derive it.  In elementary statistics one rarely has time to do and cover the full mathematics even if the students were interested in knowing about it, which they are probably not.  In our opinion, the coverage of this topic in most beginning statistics textbooks is unreadable and totally not understandable to a beginning statistics student. It is just as understandable as if it were written in Chinese characters. Yet this is a most important topic since  is ubiquitous in statistics. 

We present some ideas for explaining the sampling distribution of  and explaining why  is correct and true, based averaging rolls of multiple four-sided dice. You can watch the randomness in dice when you roll them live in class and average them live in class. This helps to visualize that  is a random quantity. With dice you can write down everything that can happen and then use these possibilities to find the sampling distribution simply by counting.  In simple examples you can look at the possible outcomes and see what is going on behind the formulas, no fancy mathematics like calculus is required.  The average behaves in ways that one would never guess, until you learn about it in a statistics class.  It is our opinion that even it if you know the calculus based proof of , you will still find the elementary approach of this paper to be interesting.  The general proof of   is a technical proof that does not really give any intuition as to what is going on.  This paper provides a lot of that intuition.

Keywords: the sampling distribution of the sample average, the standard deviation or standard error of the average.

Developing a Real-World Organizational Change Proposal in your MBA Organizational Design and Development Course

Dr. Debra Westerfelt, Associate Professor of Business Management

Ashland University, Ohio, USA

ABSTRACT

All students in the MBA Program at Ashland University take a course in Organizational Design, Development and Change Management. The majority of students in the MBA Program are working adults in professional occupations who take one or two courses at a time. This core course explores the theories and concepts managers can apply, on their own or in collaboration with an Organization Design consultant, to drive effective change management initiatives within their departments or organizations. The course explores how positive change can be created and enacted at the systems level through understanding the elements of organizational design as it relates to performance management.  Students learn techniques that would be effective if they were to serve as internal consultants in their organizations or external consultants assisting other businesses. This is achieved by preparing an organizational change proposal, often referred to as an intervention, which combines theory and practice.

KEYWORDS:  Organizational design, change management, intervention proposals

Managing in the Virtual Workplace: A Student Role-Play Consulting Project

Kellyann Berube Kowalski, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, North Dartmouth, Massachusetts, USA

Jennifer A. Swanson, Stonehill College, Easton, MA, USA

ABSTRACT

This paper presents a student role-play consulting project that focuses on managing in the virtual workplace. It is a two-part project that requires students to analyze and critically think about how management needs to change in order to adapt to the virtual workplace of today and the future. Part I is an individual assignment where students are required to research how and why the workplace has become more virtual and write a paper based on their findings. Part II is a group assignment in which students work in teams to develop and present new management theories that are applicable to the virtual workplace.

Keywords: management role-play, student project, virtual workplace

Cohort Programs and the Implication for

Business Graduate Programs

Kevin J. Wynne, Pace University, New York, USA

Jay Sholes, New York University, New York, USA

Abstract

This paper investigates the relationship between graduate business programs and the use of cohorts. The empirical results demonstrate that these cohort programs have significantly higher retention and graduation rates than the average university in the United States. With increasingly greater demands on private universities, it is becoming more important to retain recruited students. The paper will illustrate that these cohort programs can offset trends in declining enrollments. The paper will examine a Corporate Sponsored Executive MBA, Fast Track MBA program, Master of Finance, and an Executive MBA program. Using 389 – 464 observations, the authors find that retention and graduation rates are statistically higher than the national Business School average, assuming the highest standard deviation from the authors’ study. This is surely an underestimate of the true volatility of the comparative national data set, yet the data set finds a statistically significant difference (p-value< 0.01) between the data sets. This has strong implications for administrators attempting to maintain enrollments and retention rates.

Keywords: graduate business programs, cohort learning, graduate retention rates

Learn, Play, Design: Using the Escape Room Concept to Teach Creativity and Innovation in a Business Course

Shane Bowyer, Minnesota State University, Mankato, USA

ABSTRACT

Educational Escape Rooms (EER) have significantly increased over the past four years., The publications of business-related EERs, however, are limited despite the value to organizations in developing key soft skills. This paper describes a multi-activity approach using the concept of escape rooms in a business creativity and innovation course. Students were engaged in learning about escape rooms, hearing from an escape room owner, playing a professional escape room, and then designing escape rooms in small groups. The key findings indicated the students self-reported an increase in the business skills of critical thinking, creativity, and innovation. Teamwork also ranked high. These findings are similar to research published in other disciplines. However, as a result of examining the EER literature, it is recognized there needs to be more research done on business-related EERs.

Keywords: escape room, creativity, innovation, design, business

Online Student Perceptions of Effective Course Activities:

A Longitudinal Study

Lynn A. Fish and Coral R. Snodgrass, Canisius College, NY, USA

ABSTRACT

Two surveys of the business student population perceptions of online students at an AACSB Jesuit, Catholic University were conducted 6 years apart. At this University, results generally indicated that for this population, student preferences for activities for online did not change over time. However, the list of activities that the students found effective for learning was a very short list. Results have implications for instructors and administrators. 

Keywords: Student Perceptual Changes, Online

A Preliminary Study of Age and Gender and Their Influence on Student Perspectives of Online versus Face-to-Face Education at a Jesuit Institution

Lynn A.  Fish and Coral R.  Snodgrass, Canisius College, NY, USA

ABSTRACT

As technology continues to evolve, insight into student perspectives of online versus face-to-face education is important to improving student understanding and motivation. Over time peoples’ perspectives change.  The purpose of this phase is to study how age and gender affect business student perceptions of online education.

Keywords: student perspectives, online education, face-to-face, age, gender

Online Learning And The New Normal

Herbert Rau Ph.D.,

Associate Professor, Utica College. Utica, New York, USA

ABSTRACT:

Educators have always experienced challenges in performing their responsibilities, and those challenges have become more complex with the advent of COVID-19 and remote learning.  While remote learning had increased in importance prior to the current pandemic, its surge in implementation during 2020 has exposed some limitations and issues.  Different styles of learning appear to directly impact the effectiveness of online learning.  A small exploratory study of 200+ graduate students was un1dertaken and the results of this study suggesting a number of potential strategies and further areas for research.

Keywords: Online Learning, Human Dynamics, Learning Styles

Moving Towards Mass-Customization in Higher Education

Herbert Rau Ph.D.,

Associate Professor, Utica College. Utica, New York, USA

ABSTRACT:

The online capstone course for an MBA in Economic Crime and Fraud Management offered at Utica College was redesigned from a traditional structure (where the Instructor unilaterally decides all elements of the course) to a structure that is guided by a principle that attempts to utilize the concept of mass-customization and student centered learning.  Analysis of key indicators, as measured by the graduate students enrolled in this graduate class, suggests that the redesign achieved improvement in key indicators.

Keywords:

Student centered learning, online course structure, mass-customization course design

Digital Marketing and Marketing Education:  A Review of Marketing Curriculum in AACSB-Accredited Business Schools

Retha Price, Mississippi College – Clinton, Mississippi, USA

Kevin Pauli, Mississippi College – Clinton, Mississippi, USA

Tammy Arthur, Mississippi College – Clinton, Mississippi, USA

ABSTRACT

The rapid growth of digital marketing technologies has transformed marketing practice and created demand for digitally savvy marketing graduates.  Over the past decade both scholars and practitioners have called for a marketing curriculum overhaul to better align it with current marketing practice.  This study examines 545 AACSB accredited business schools within the United States to determine the extent to which digital marketing courses and specializations are offered in undergraduate marketing programs. Results are compared to previous findings. Our results suggest that business schools are committing more resources to the digital marketing field of study by offering more courses and specializations in the form of majors, concentrations, and certifications.

Keywords:  digital marketing, digital marketing curriculum, curriculum development, digital marketing education

Blockchain: What It Is, What We and Our Students Learned - A Policy Research Project

Rick Kreminski, Department of Mathematics and Physics,

Colorado State University Pueblo, Colorado, USA

Carl Wright, Department of Accounting, Hasan School of Business,

Colorado State University Pueblo, Colorado, USA

ABSTRACT

This paper recounts how a narrow policy research project with a multidisciplinary team of undergraduates and faculty, concerning how blockchain might address shareholder-related ownership and voting issues, led to our coming to know, then addressing, the level of understanding of blockchain technology among a subset of the public: state government staff; elected legislators; university students, faculty and staff (including upper-level campus administrators); and other members of the public.  We include how the workshops we developed can incorporate hands-on blockchain education into the university-level accounting and business curricula.

Keywords:  blockchain, stock certificates, hands-on workshops, Ethereum

Video Game and Social Media Usage vis-à-vis Academic Performance in a Marketing Principles Course: An Empirical Analysis

James C. Brau, Brigham Young University – Provo, Utah, USA

Finnegan McKinley, Brigham Young University – Provo, Utah, USA

Elizabeth Vorkink Mohler, Brigham Young University – Provo, Utah, USA

Michael J. Swenson, Brigham Young University – Provo, Utah, USA

ABSTRACT

As video game and social media usage continues to grow, particularly in the 18-34-year age group, researchers and educators seek to understand the effect of these technologies on academic performance. The purpose of this research is to examine video game and social media usage vis-à-vis academic performance in the business school—specifically in marketing. Using a sample of 652 university students drawn from a marketing principles course at a large private university, we gather data from an extensive survey of 131 questions. The results suggest judicious video game usage does not have a negative effect on academic performance. However, unbridled gaming is negatively correlated with academic performance. Three different measurements of social media usage indicate a negative correlation with academic performance. Our findings have implications for both educators and students.

Keywords: marketing education, video games, social media

Developing Mindful Leaders: An Experiential Learning Project

Cynthia Roberts, Indiana University Northwest – Gary, Indiana, USA

ABSTRACT

There has been increasing mention in the popular literature around the inclusion of meditation and mindfulness in the development of leadership. Research has shown that mindfulness practices enhance mental health, improve performance in every field of endeavor, and can help develop emotional intelligence and resonant leadership. Although mindfulness training has been embraced by many organizations in the corporate arena, there is little mention of its implementation in an academic setting. This paper discusses the incorporation of an experiential learning component into a senior level undergraduate leadership course which presents an option to develop mindfulness. In addition to outlining the activity, outcomes are discussed as well as reflections for future practice. Although initially met with skepticism, participants shared outcomes which were overwhelmingly positive.

Keywords: leadership development, mindfulness, experiential learning

Negotiation Strategy: “Declining Increments of Concession”

An Effective Classroom Role Play

Michael R. Carrell, Northern Kentucky University, Highland Heights, Kentucky, USA

Jennifer Taylor, Northern Kentucky University, Highland Heights, Kentucky, USA

ABSTRACT

The successful teaching of critical negotiation concepts is greatly enhanced by effective classroom exercises. This paper provides a classroom-tested role-play exercise that in about an hour successfully teaches students how to prepare a strategy for making successful counter-offers during a negotiation that is largely a single-issue negotiation such as buying a house, car, appliance, etc. It also provides instructors with debriefing suggestions that include three teachable moments. To prepare for the exercise students are introduced to common opening offer strategies and common strategies for making counter-offers.  A role-playing exercise directs one student to utilize the “declining increments of concession” strategy when making counter-offers, while the other student is instructed to utilize a “meet in the middle” strategy. In classes involving hundreds of students over fourteen years, students demonstrated their successful utilization of the “declining increments of concession” strategy to achieve their desired price, and have thus achieved a more desirable outcome than the commonly utilized “meet in the middle” strategy! The exercise not only enables students to correctly identify and utilize the strategy in negotiation situations, but more importantly, they recognize the strategy as one that they can use in their daily personal and professional lives. The exercise included in this paper was developed by the authors and successfully used in many “real world” cases, and has been classroom tested. The exercise can easily be utilized in courses on negotiation, conflict resolution, organizational behavior, management, psychology, and labor relations.

Keywords: teaching negotiation, negotiation exercise, opening offers, negotiation counter-offers, pattern of increments of decreasing concessions.

Enhancing Student Engagement and Increasing Student Success

Using an Online Discussion of the Great Recession

Mark Ray Reavis, University of Central Arkansas, Conway AR, United States

ABSTRACT

Student success involves not only the attainment of a high level of academic achievement, but also includes students having a high level of satisfaction with the overall educational process. Enhancing student engagement helps to achieve student success. This paper relates how an online discussion assignment may be used to engage students and how this can lead to greater student success. Several important factors should be considered by an Instructor when designing a discussion assignment. The discussion topic should be interesting with various perspectives considered. The topic selected should be relevant to the course and to the students. The topic used for the discussion assignment analyzed in this paper is the Great Recession. The assignment was included in a Money, Banking, and Financial Markets class over six sections from 2018-2020. Using a discussion assignment at the very beginning of the class has specific benefits, allowing the Instructor to introduce the class content and getting students to engage with each other. This method/assignment can serve to introduce a quality teaching presence, cognitive presence, and social presence in the classroom from the very beginning of the course. These elements have all been shown to increase student success.

Keywords:  Economics Education, Great Recession, Student Engagement, Student Success

Purchasing Cycle Case: Systems, Accounting, and Business Issues

Robert N. West, Villanova University, Villanova, PA (USA)

ABSTRACT

This case focuses on the purchasing cycle and ERP system issues by first examining a straightforward purchase-to-pay example and then delving into more complex issues.  You may have heard the term, “best practices.”  ERP systems are programmed for best practices.  This case provides two examples of the accounting, systems, and control implications when a company employs a process that differs from the “best practices” for which the ERP system was configured.  In addition, the case examines management decisions around sole sourcing or using multiple suppliers for a key raw material and it examines the management issue of how to reward (bonus) purchasing department personnel (buyers).

Keywords: Purchasing Cycle, ERP systems, Purchase Returns, Consignment, Foreign Currency, Sourcing

Analyzing Distance Learning During COVID-19 To Innovate future Course Delivery

Camille Avent, Thomas Jefferson University, Pennsylvania, USA

Lindsey Richardson, Thomas Jefferson University, Pennsylvania, USA

ABSTRACT

Higher education experienced an extreme disruption from the COVid-19 pandemic which highlighted the necessity to examine teaching modalities and accommodate a broader range of student learning needs.  These realizations inspired a case study for three courses at a University in Philadelphia during the Fall 2020 semester. The goal was                to investigate student learning motivations during the pandemic and provide further insight about the value of these distance learning models to support the future of higher education course delivery. The study did find a high degree of anxiety surrounding virtual learning. Still, it unveiled meaningful opportunities for universities to explore this modality in addition to course curriculum optimization to better serve the next generation of learners. Creating the proper technological infrastructure, university resources, and socialization around hybrid and HyFlex modalities, in particular, will improve the overall perception of them. 

Keywords: COVID-19, Distance Learning, Hybrid, HyFlex, Nexus Learning, Pandemic, Socialization, Student Motivation, Student Engagement, Virtual Classroom