Howard Teall Innovation in Accounting Education Award - Past Winners  

2010

Mark Holtzblatt of the Roosevelt University and Norbert Tschakert, University of the Virgin Islands have been awarded first place and a prize of $500 for his submission "An Innovative Technology-Based IFRS Student Video Competition: Experientially Connecting to IFRS Expert Guest Speakers":  

The submission was an innovative IFRS Student Video Competition conducted between two universities in the fall 2009 semester.  The competition provided an experiential learning opportunity for 56 graduate level IFRS students.  A total of 46 recognized partners, professors, accounting standard setters and other experts from around the world were identified, contacted and interviewed.  Numerous communication technologies enabled this collaborative venture to connect the expert interviewees with the student interviewers.  The end result was the creation of eighteen IFRS related videos, 10 to 15 minutes in length, available on a special educational Vimeo.com channel for the benefit of students and professors worldwide.

While the Inter-University IFRS Student Video Competition involved only two universities, an expansion of such a program to multiple universities in Canada, the U.S. and the world is possible. In addition, the innovative teaching techniques could be applied to many other accounting topics.  

Norman Sheehan and Ganesh Vaidyanathan from the University of Saskatchewan have been awarded second place and a prize of $250 for "Dr. PC: A Multi-media Management Control Exercise": 

Dr. PC focused on having students develop a management control system for a small computer repair business based on a management control framework, a publically available video on computer repair companies, and group interaction.  Management control systems are designed to encourage employees to act in ways which are congruent with the organization's goals.  The exercise put the students into the role of the business owner to identify and implement business policies and procedures to promote the success of the business. 

2009

Fred Pries of the University of Guelph has been awarded first place and a prize of $500 for his submission "Intermediate Financial Accounting Simulation":  

An accounting simulation focused on the topics covered in an Intermediate Financial accounting course. The simulation was developed to help students understand how the separate topics in the course relate to the accounting systems and financial statements of a company. In the simulation, students played the role of a newly hired accountant for an owner-managed engineering company based on a real company.  Each module of the simulation was linked to a particular topic covered in the Intermediate Financial Accounting course.  Students analyzed this information, recommended what adjustments were needed to the books and financial statements of the company and wrote reports to the CFO explaining the basis for their recommendations.

Mary Oxner at Saint Francis Xavier University has been awarded second place and a cheque for $250 for "Speak Up, Redesigning Student Oral Presentations in Management Accounting Curriculum": 

Research, professional emphasis and anecdotal evidence suggest that accounting students have difficulty with both oral presentations and case analysis.  A pedagogical approach which combines the development of issue identification and approach assessment skills in a case analysis and the development of presentation skills was introduced into a junior year management accounting curriculum. The approach required students to introduce an assigned case analysis during class by orally providing an introduction to the issues identification and assessment of approaches in a structured manner. Results from the study and students’ self assessment on their oral communication and case analysis skills development revealed that the students were more comfortable with oral presentations outside of the classroom (e.g. group meetings, society meetings, etc.), indicated that the focus on issue identification and approach to analysis developed their case analysis skills and they preferred this pedagogical approach to other approaches.