Accounting

What is Accounting A level about?

Accounting is the language of business: it tells managers whether they have made the right decisions. It tells investors how their companies are doing and it helps decision makers decide on the best course of action. It involves cash, profits, planning, monitoring and making sure that a) the business survives and b) it is successful.

What will I do in Accounting A level?

• Learn how to produce a set of accounts for a business
• Understand the key elements of a firm's finances
• Be able to produce financial records for businesses, find errors in accounts and check for fraud
• Learn how to assess a firm's financial position
• Find out how a profitable company can run out of cash

In the first year you will learn the skills of recording financial transactions, completing a set of accounts and analysing these.

In the second year you will focus more on using financial information for decision making and forecasting.

What does the course consist of?

At AS level the course is useful for anyone interested in finance or business. In the first year you will study:

• Unit 1: Accounting Principles
  This includes double entry bookkeeping, preparing financial statements for small businesses and the use of ICT in accounting
• Unit 2: Financial Accounting
  This includes producing and analysing financial statements for organisations, analysing accounts using ratios and controlling and monitoring of debt.

At A level students study Management Accounting and Company accounts, acquiring skills useful in managing a business. The topics include:

• Unit 3: Management Accounting
  Budgets, capital expenditure projects, stock management, break even analysis and types of finance.
• Unit 4: Company accounts and their interpretation
  Including manufacturing businesses and learning about shares and the capital structure of balance sheets.

Whom does the subject suit?

It is very helpful to be relatively good at Maths or very methodical and logical in your approach to work. You do not need to have studied Accounting at GCSE. The subject involves understanding various accounting methods, applying these and interpreting the results. In class you would be expected to discuss your findings.

Accounting AS and A level works well in combination with Economics, Business Studies, Maths and Sciences. Accounting and Finance are essential parts of any business degree so getting a good foundation at AS or A level is very advantageous.

Whatever career path or profession you wish to follow accounting is a good discipline to learn as it trains you to work in a logical and structured way. It may also (with luck!) put you in a better position to organise your own finances.

What will it be like studying Accounting at d'Overbroeck's?

You will study in a small group of students: Accounting class sizes tend to be small and average six students in the first year. This allows for a high degree of supervision and personal attention from the teacher.

Students get a high degree of satisfaction from working through a question, calculating figures and then presenting them as a set of final accounts for a small business. They also enjoy analysing the numbers to evaluate the performance of an enterprise and discussing their findings in class. With regard to company accounts they can carry out analysis to find out about the potential rewards of investing in a company and judge its financial strengths and weaknesses. Students find it a challenging but rewarding subject.

What do students say about the subject:

'I originally thought that I would study Accounting at AS and not continue it to A level. However, I liked the subject more than I thought and I continued it into my second year. Accounting is very logical and does not require a strong mathematical knowledge and there are not that many topics in the syllabus compared to other subjects. I have found it especially useful for my Business Studies course.' Jemima King went on to read Business Management at Reading University.

'It's not like Maths but it's very logical and I enjoy working out a problem and getting a set of results'. Ary Dipotontro went on to read Accounting and Business Management at City University.

Who will teach me?

Accounting is taught at the College by Clare Wildish who has worked as an accountant in small and large companies in industry. Clare enjoys teaching this subject very much because she thinks that in doing so the students gain some very valuable 'real life skills' which will help them not only at university but when they start work.

What can I study with this subject at university?

Accounting A level is widely respected and is useful for a range of degree courses demonstrating an ability for numerical, analytical and evaluative skills. Students go on to study Business, Economics, Finance and Accounting degrees. Accounting A level is not a prerequisite to study these degree courses but it proves to be very helpful and gives students greater confidence in tackling the finance courses at university.