Course Syllabus

ACCT-4836-SS841
Spring 2024

Instructor: Marc Pilon, PhD, CPA, CA, Associate Professor

School of Business
Office: H128
Email: [email protected]
Office hours: Virtual, contact by email to schedule a time

Office hours: Since each student learns at their own pace, I will strive to answer your
questions as soon as possible rather than having set office hours. Therefore, please
reach out to me if you have any questions regarding the material being presented or
other related interests you may have. You may also wish to discuss graduation
requirements, career options, and much more. I’m very flexible and I would be happy to
discuss these with you anytime.

Land acknowledgement: Nipissing University sits on the territory of Nipissing First

Nation, the territory of the Anishnabek, within lands protected by the Robinson Huron
Treaty of 1850. We are grateful to be able to live and learn on these lands with all our
relations.

COURSE CALENDAR DESCRIPTION

Course Description: The major topics in this course include business
combinations, long-term inter-corporate investments and the preparation of
consolidated financial statements. Attention is also given to accounting for
income taxes and to the translation of foreign currency transactions; and foreign
currency financial statements.

Delivery method: Synchronous online

Prerequisites: ACCT-2106 and ACCT-2107

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COURSE INTRODUCTION
Program structure
Whether an accountant works within an entity or as an external auditor or
consultant, he or she needs to gain a thorough understanding of accounting
principles, their applications and their impact, so as to be able to make strategic
choices, analyze information and develop professional judgment. Financial
statement users expect the information published by entities to be faithful to
reality, and relies heavily on the expertise of professional accountants to achieve
this.

Nipissing University’s financial accounting program comprises a total of five

courses: two introductory courses in the first and second years (ACCT-1106 and
ACCT-1107), two intermediate courses (ACCT-2106 and ACCT-2107) and one
advanced course (ACCT-4836).

By the end of the first course, students should be able to read simple financial
statements from a variety of entities, understand how these statements are
compiled, and summarily evaluate the published results. In the second course,
they will be given a general study of the financial reporting conceptual framework
and the various components of the financial statements.

At the intermediate level, we take a more detailed look at the conceptual

framework (characteristics, principles, and definitions), accounting standards
IFRS and ASPE, the various components that make up financial statements, and
the financial statements themselves.

At the advanced level, companies are studied in an international context:

business combinations, and foreign currency translations; as well as an overview
of not-for-profit accounting.

Course content overview

ACCT-4836 Advanced Accounting Topics I, is the final financial accounting
course and applies the financial reporting standards in accordance with
Canadian Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), focusing on
International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) for publicly accountable
entities, Accounting Standards for Private Enterprises (ASPE), and Accounting
Standards for Not-for-Profit Organizations (ASNPO).

Pedagogical approach
The course content can be found within Blackboard, which is organized by week.
Each week contains a summary presentation, assignment, homework, Excel
templates, and a discussion forum where you can ask your questions. You may
also ask your questions by email if that is your preference.

This course contains many new concepts that can be challenging for students.
Budgeting your time and being attentive to the reading and evaluations are

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 critical in being successful. Your weekly preparation to complete the required
readings, homework, and assignments will require about 10-15 hours per week.
Budget your time accordingly. During your progress, you will want to summarize
important information that you have learned, and flag any topics or homework
that you had trouble with in order to review again before the final exam. Simply
reading the solutions to the problems will not give the necessary abilities and
speed required to perform well on the final exam.

Students who adhere to a pre-determined study schedule are more likely to

succeed. The course outline below indicates the weekly lesson topics.

The weekly evaluations allow student the opportunity to apply the topics
addressed in the textbook to concrete situations. The weekly evaluations also
have hard deadlines designed to keep you on track. From years of experience, I
know that there is a direct correlation in that students that submit work on time
and progress steadily through the course are more likely to succeed well in the
course. The goal is not just to pass the course, but learn and understand as
much of the material as possible so as to be well prepared for the next steps in
your academic and professional journey.

Class time will be used to summarise key concepts and clarify any difficulties.
Class discussions and cooperation and strongly encouraged, and there is always
time to answer questions.

It is important to note that CPA requires a strong student code of conduct and
any instances of academic dishonesty will be fully sanctioned.

The ability to communicate effectively and in a professional manner is a critical

skill. Therefore, all emails addressed to the instructor should be written with
attentiveness, and include the following items:
- the subject line should be descriptive and start with the course code
- use formal salutations, proper punctuation, complete sentences
- provide clear and detailed information about the nature of your
question

COURSE LEARNING OUTCOMES:

The primary objective of this course is to assist you in pursuing a career as a
professional accountant or financial analyst. In preparation, the overall learning
outcomes at the completion of this course are:
1. Understand the broader role of financial accounting in society as a source
of information about economic activity;
2. Interpret the conceptual framework underlying financial accounting and
provide an understanding of basic financial accounting theory;
3. Develop professional judgement.
It is expected that at the end of this course, students will be able to:
4. Identify different forms of equity investments and business combinations;

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 5. Apply basic concepts in accounting for equity investments and accounting
for a business combination;
6. Prepare consolidated financial statements that reflect the elimination of
non-controlling interest and intercompany transactions;
7. Account for various forms of participation in joint arrangements;
8. Understand the impact of deferred taxes on the accounting of a business
combination;
9. Describe segment disclosure requirements;
10. Convert foreign currency transactions and account balances into the
financial statement presentation currency;
11. Describe the concept of hedging and identify items that could be used to
hedge currency risk;
12. Understand the difference in foreign currency risks between accounting
exposure and economic exposure;
13. Prepare translated financial statements for a foreign operation;
14. Prepare financial statements for a NFPO by applying the restricted fund
method and the deferral method.

REQUIRED RESOURCES:

Textbook: Modern Advanced Accounting in Canada, 10th Edition. Herauf and

Mbagwu (2022).

Connect is mandatory for this course and purchase options with the textbook are
available when registering.

Connect is a digital learning platform designed to promote learning. The platform

has many resources, including tutorials, activities, and templates. Connect will
also be used for evaluations. When registering for Connect, please use your
Nipissing University email account.

You will also need a calculator, as you will find it useful when undertaking various
calculations.

RECOMMENDED RESOURCES:

The CPA Canada Standards and Guidance Collection (commonly known as the
CPA Canada Handbook) is available online through the Nipissing University
Harris Learning Library.

System for Electronic Document Analysis and Retrieval (SEDAR). Montréal:

Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA): http://www.sedar.com/

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COURSE EVALUATION
Summary:

Item Date and time Overall Grade Weight

Weekly assignments 10%
Weekly homework 10%
Midterm June 25, 6-7:20pm 35%
Final Exam TBD 45%
Total 100%

Details:

The weekly assignments and homework use the online learning platform
Connect. The weekly assignments consist of “Smartbook” adaptive
questions designed to guide students towards key concepts covered in
each week. Students will attempt fill in the blanks and multiple-choice type
questions. Where the student is unsure of the answer, they may read
about the concept before attempting the question. Students will need to
complete a set number of concepts – there is no fixed time limit, but
usually each assignment should not take more than 2 hours.

The weekly homework requires students to complete questions similar to

the end-of-chapter problems. This homework is designed to be reasonably
completed in approximately 2 to 3 hours after the student has read the
textbook. Attempting the homework without reasonable preparation will
likely need more time. Students will have unlimited attempts to improve on
their work.

The work week is considered Monday through Sunday, and therefore

weekly submissions are due Sundays by 23:59 EST. Both assignments
and homework have hard deadlines to help ensure you stay on track and
on time over the course of the semester. As such, there are no extensions
and late submissions to the evaluations will be graded as 0%. There are
no makeups for missed submissions. Once, submitted, all solutions to the
evaluations are provided for your review.

The exams are open book and will be completed online in Blackboard.
While the exams are open book, time will be constrained in that there will
be many questions to answer limiting the possibility to research concepts.
Therefore, the exams are designed to reward students who have prepared
well, while students that have not prepared well and need to go back to
the course material will run out of time. The exams will comprise of a mix
of multiple choice, short answer, case-type and calculations type
questions covering. The duration of the midterm exam is 80 minutes and
the duration of the final exam is 150 minutes.

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COURSE OUTLINE

Week 1 – May 7
Chapter and Topic Chapter 1: Conceptual framework for financial reporting
Evaluation Homework 1 and Assignment 1
Week 2 – May 14
Chapter and Topic Chapter 2: Investments in equity securities
Evaluation Homework 2 and Assignment 2
Week 3 – May 21
Chapter and Topic Chapter 3: Business combinations
Evaluation Homework 3 and Assignment 3
Week 4 – May 28
Chapter and Topic Chapter 4: Consolidation of non-wholly owned
subsidiaries
Evaluation Homework 4 and Assignment 4
Week 5 – June 4
Chapter and Topic Chapter 5: Consolidation subsequent to acquisition date
Evaluation Homework 5 and Assignment 5
Week 6 – June 11
Chapter and Topic Chapter 6: Intercompany inventory and land profits
Evaluation Homework 6 and Assignment 6
Study week
June 17–21
Week 7 – Midterm exam
June 25, 6-7:20pm
Week 8 – July 1
Chapter and Topic Chapter 7: Intercompany profits in depreciable assets
Evaluation Homework 8 and Assignment 8
Week 9 – July 9
Chapter and Topic Chapter 9: Joint arrangements and segment disclosures
Evaluation Homework 9 and Assignment 9
Week 10 – July 16
Chapter and Topic Chapter 10: Foreign currency transactions
Evaluation Homework 10 and Assignment 10
Week 11 – July 23
Chapter and Topic Chapter 11: Translation and consolidation of foreign
operations
Evaluation Homework 11 and Assignment 11
Week 12 – July 30
Chapter and Topic Chapter 12: Accounting for Not-for-Profit organizations
Evaluation Homework 12 and Assignment 12
Week 14 – Final exam
TBD

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COURSE POLICIES AND OTHER IMPORTANT NOTICES

1. Policy for Recording of Lectures/Materials

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services/accessibility-services/faculty-resources/classroom-
accommodations

The Ontario Human Rights Commission ‘Policy and Guidelines on Disabilities

and the Duty to Accommodate’ (2001) details the responsibility of the University
to provide reasonable academic accommodations to students with disabilities.
This includes providing accommodations that will allow for the removal of
disadvantage to learning and the demonstration of learning. The
accommodations will have been deemed to be reasonable, necessary and
supported by documentation provided to Student Accessibility Services.

For some students with disabilities, audio-recording lectures is a necessary

accommodation which enables full access to course and lecture materials that
may otherwise be unavailable. Once a student has recorded a lecture, the
teaching material remains the property of the instructor and is not to be disclosed
unless the professor has otherwise consented. Such recording is allowable under
existing Canadian copyright legislation due to the exception of ‘fair dealing’. For
more information about copyright law please visit the Canadian Intellectual
Property Office (CIPO) or view the Copyright Act.

Students with disabilities have permission to audio record and, based on the
terms defined in fair dealing use the material “for purposes of private study,
research, criticism [or] review” (CIPO, 2011). However, the information contained
in the audio-recorded lecture is still protected under federal and international
copyright legislation and, therefore, may not be published or quoted without the
lecturer’s explicit consent and without properly identifying and crediting the
lecturer.

2. Grading Standards/link to Academic Calendar

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viewcatalog&catalogid=10&chapterid=754&topicgroupid=3687&loaduseredi
ts=False

Grades and the Basis for Assessment

Letter Grades and Grading Standards
“A” (80-100%)
“B” (70-79%)
“C” (60-69%)
“D” (50-59%)
“F” (0-49%)

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 “A” indicates Exceptional Performance: comprehensive in-depth knowledge of
the principles and materials treated in the course, fluency in communicating that
knowledge and independence in applying material and principles.

“B” indicates Good Performance: thorough understanding of the breadth of

materials and principles treated in the course and ability to apply and
communicate that understanding effectively.

“C” indicates Satisfactory Performance: basic understanding of the breadth of

principles and materials treated in the course and an ability to apply and
communicate that understanding competently.

“D” indicates Minimally Competent Performance: adequate understanding of

most principles and materials treated in the course, but significant weakness in
some areas and in the ability to apply and communicate that understanding.

“F” indicates Failure: inadequate or fragmentary knowledge of the principles and

materials treated in the course or failure to complete the work required in the
course.

“I” indicates Incomplete.

“W” indicates Withdrawal with permission.

3. Academic Integrity Policy

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talog&catalogid=10&chapterid=754&topicgroupid=3691&loaduseredits=False

The University takes a most serious view of offences against academic honesty
such as plagiarism, cheating, impersonation and the presentation of altered or
falsified documents. Penalties for dealing with such offences will be strictly
enforced.

Plagiarism
Essentially, plagiarism involves submitting or presenting work in a course as if it
were the student’s own work done expressly for that particular course when, in
fact, it is not. Plagiarism should be noted and reported to the Dean. Students
should be informed of the University’s definition and policy on plagiarism at the
beginning of each course.

Most commonly plagiarism exists when:

the work submitted or presented was done, in whole or in part, by an individual
other than the one submitting or presenting the work; parts of the work (e.g.
phrases, ideas through paraphrase or sentences) are taken from another source
without reference to the original author; the whole work (e.g. an essay) is copied
from another source; and/or a student submits or presents a work in one course

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 which has also been submitted or presented in another course (although it may
be completely original with that student) without the knowledge or prior
agreement of the instructors involved.

Cheating

Cheating at tests or examinations includes, but is not limited to, dishonest or

attempted dishonest conduct such as speaking to other candidates or
communicating with them under any circumstances whatsoever; bringing into the
examination room any textbook, notebook, or memoranda not authorized by the
examiner, or leaving answer papers exposed to view.

4. For information on Petitions and Grade Appeals, follow this link:

https://academiccalendar.nipissingu.ca/Catalog/ViewCatalog.aspx?pageid=viewca
talog&catalogid=10&chapterid=754&topicgroupid=3690&loaduseredits=False

5. Library statement
The Harris Learning Library enriches academic achievement, scholarly research,
and life-long learning goals by supporting exploration, innovation, teaching, and
research. The Library works in partnership with Nipissing University and
Canadore College students, staff, and faculty through the provision of exemplary
services and a diverse range of resources. The Learning Library home page
(http://www.eclibrary.ca/library/) is your Gateway to library services, instructional
tutorials, LibGuides and a wealth of academic books, articles, and streaming
videos accessible through the OMNI Search tool. Friendly, knowledgeable staff
are always ready to provide help by email, phone, or in person.

6. Student Code of Conduct

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services/student-rights-responsibilities

At Nipissing University, students are free to think, speak, write, create, study,
learn, pursue social, cultural and other interests, and freely associate together for
all these purposes, subject to the requirement that they respect the rights of
members of the University and general community to pursue these same
freedoms and privileges. In order to secure these rights, the University will use its
best efforts to ensure the following: that those who wish to teach and those who
wish to learn can do so under proper conditions; that academic and general
facilities are available to those who wish to use them for their normal purposes;
that freedom of movement and freedom from harassment are protected; that all
property, including records, documents, and the like is protected; that those who
wish to file a complaint have the right to do so without fear of reprisal.

7. Supporting Students
Your success and well-being are important. If you find yourself struggling while at
Nipissing University and it is having a negative impact on your academic
progress, success, or mental health, please be aware there are many supports

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 available to help through Student Development & Services (SDS). Academic
writing, math and science supports; peer tutoring; individualized accommodations
for students with disabilities; personal or group counselling; and sexual violence
prevention and education awareness, are only a few of the support services
aimed at helping you succeed.

SDS also works closely with faculty to support your success while in class. One
of the ways this is done is through Student Retention Alert. Student Retention
Alert is an early alert referral system that allows faculty and staff to identify a
concern regarding your academic progress or well-being and connect you with
resources or support services on campus. You are under no obligation to follow
through with a referral unless you want to; it is your choice unless otherwise
stated (i.e. a breach of the Code of Student Rights and Responsibilities). Student
Retention Alert does not affect your academic standing, transcript, or overall
academic record and your information is kept private and confidential; it is only
accessible to authorized University personnel who will reach out to you to see
how they can help.

For more information or to reach out for support contact:

Student Development and Services

Visit https://www.nipissingu.ca/sds or email [email protected]

Student Retention Alert

Visit www.nipissingu.ca/nusuccess or email [email protected]

Nipissing is committed to supporting your success and well-being!

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