from VCCA Journal, Volume 6, Number 1, Winter 1991, 50-53
© Copyright 1991 VCCA Journal
During the summer of 1990, I was awarded a grant by Virginia Western to study accounting practices in Europe, a wonderful opportunity to observe other educational systems and the culture of different countries. The greatest benefit of something like this is the appreciation you have for your own situation when you return. I am very grateful to have been born in the United States, to have had the education that Virginia state schools provided, and to have been employed by the Virginia Community College System.
Since most accounting in Europe is now done according to the standards for the European Community, I felt it would be easier to learn accounting principles in English. However, I found that this was not altogether true: the British and Americans do not always use the same terminology. For example, merchandise inventory in the UK is listed as stock. We think of stock as marketable securities. This can be very confusing.
My studies began at Chichester College of Technology in Chichester, England. I also visited Adapep (a small, private business school) in Arras, France, and the Frederich Feld Schule (a technical school, much like a community college) in Giessen, Germany. The European Community and its impact on business is a constant topic in business classes, so I visited the headquarters in Brussels, Belgium.
The European Educational System
It is difficult to understand the college system in Europe because of the differences in secondary education. Students go to public school until they are 16; then they take exams which are either A Level or O Level. The A Level exams are for admission to the university; the O Level exams are occupational. If students get satisfactory scores on the A Levels, they may be admitted to the university, and their education is free; however, they are only allowed to apply to five schools. There is a possibility they will not be admitted to any of them, and a year will be lost until they can try again. This is even more scary because they do not get the scores from the A Levels until August and school starts in September. According to a professor at CCOT, if students do not have the scores to get into the university of their choice, their parents may be able to pay for them to attend there.
If students do not want to attend the university, they may take the O Levels and get jobs. The scores on the O Levels will help determine what kind of job they will get. They may continue their education with something called "Work Release." These students take classes at schools like Chichester, usually only part of one day per week. At the end of the term, they will take a higher O Level for their particular occupation. There are O Levels in Accounting, Secretarial Skills, Building Trades, etc. Chichester College also has students taking English, math, chemistry, etc., so that they could retake the A Levels, get higher scores, and then enter the university. The secondary schools also offer post-graduate classes for higher scores on the A Levels which seems to be a duplication of effort and expense. There is no transfer credit as we know it, only the placement because of the score on the A Level test.
The number of high school students going to college is very different from the United States. According to Richard Critchfield in the May, 1990, issue of World Monitor, only 14 percent of British students go on to college (traditional four-year schools) compared to 50 percent of high school students in the United States (38).
The college or university system is also quite different. Law is an undergraduate degree, with only one additional year of school to sit for the bar. Most accountants (over 50 percent) do not take any accounting at the university. They major in some other liberal arts curriculum. They then get a job with an accounting firm and take accounting classes at night. There are four levels of accounting certification with the highest level, the Chartered Accountant, being similar to our Certified Public Accountant designation.
College Funding
Like Virginia, England is having a budget crunch that has affected colleges greatly. Chichester College is currently funded by the County of Sussex. Starting in September 1990, each school must be self-supporting. As a result, the college is starting several commercial ventures. One of the most interesting of these was the development of software by the faculty under a contract with Lloyd's of London which produced income for the college general fund.
Teaching Situation
Chichester College, the same age as Virginia Western, has approximately 2000 FTE's. Since land is at such a premium in England, it has a very small campus. Course load is by seniority. All of the teachers in the business department shared one large office. The equipment provided evidently was not as sturdy as that of the VCCS, and much of it was broken. The chalkboard was a pull-down screen similar to an overhead screen. According to the May issue of World Monitor, this lack of equipment is prevalent in all of the state-owned schools in the UK (36).
Chichester College has many computers for student use; however, class use and lab time is limited. They have the same network as we do at VWCC for some of the computers; others are on a different network. The automation of the offices is not nearly as sophisticated as the in VCCS. They do not have student records or accounting records on the computer, for example.
Another difference is textbook support. The textbook for beginning accounting is a much smaller paper back. There are no working papers, study guides, software, etc. The computer is not used to teach accounting at all.
The colleges in France and Germany are much more progressive. Computer use is much greater in France and all of the classrooms are very well equipped; however, they do have their accounting records on the computer. The Frederich Feld Schule does occupational training and some remedial work for higher scores on their equivalent of A Levels by computer.
Businesses in England
While I was in England, I visited the accounting departments of three businesses. Two of them were US businesses, IBM and John Wiley Publishers. The accounting department at John Wiley was using an American accounting computer program. Even though the accountant had been trained in England, he had no trouble converting. The only new account was one for fluctuations in currency.
The IBM plant was very much like an IBM plant in this country. Everything there was on computer and they were developing software for use both in Europe and the United States. All of the employees I talked with were British.
The third business I visited was the Midland Bank, a British-owned bank in Chichester with branches all over the UK. The employees that I talked with had all begun working when they were 16. None of them had gone to college at all. They wore uniforms, even employees in the accounting office. The office itself did not have modern equipment--it reminded me of a US bank about 25 years ago. The bank closed later that week for renovations, but I do not know the extent of them.
The Return Visit
Two of the teachers from Chichester came to Virginia Western in September for an international accounting seminar. It was the first trip to the United States for both of them. Some of their observations were very interesting. Barbara Darby, one of the visiting teachers, was surprised at the speed of cars on the highway--she was expecting much faster speeds and the kind of driving you see during a police chase on television. She also asked to see where the poor people lived. I think she was looking for a ghetto area like New York, again something she had seen on the movies.
Our VWCC students really enjoyed talking with Barbara. One of the interesting points was that McDonald's in Chichester does not have a Drive Thru; in fact probably none in England have a Drive Thru. (The Chichester McDonald's does not even have golden arches.) The American students were amazed at the early closing of all businesses in England. Pubs close at 10:30 p.m. and almost everything else closes at 5:30 p.m. Barbara also remarked how clean everything was at Virginia Western and what wonderful facilities we have. She was also surprised at the lack of graffiti.
Final Observations
When I visited the headquarters of the EC in Brussels, soldiers of the Belgian Army dressed in riot gear were there guarding the building. It was encircled by army trucks and concertina wire. I was allowed in the building, but the situation was very tense. We were told that a demonstration was planned by some of the Belgian labor unions who were protesting the fact that the EC employees were paid better wages than other workers in Brussels. The strange thing about this was that there was no mention of it in any English language newspaper the next day. Had this event occurred at the United Nations, every newspaper in the world would have had a headline about the problems in the US. It seems that our problems are always enlarged by the world press.
Part of the reason for this is that we are misunderstood by Europeans. Most of the people in Europe have visited other European countries, but few have been to America, and they cannot imagine the amount of space and distance here. Americans have the reverse problem: we think of Germany or England as countries like the USA while they are not as large as Texas.
A cab driver in Chichester told us that he had read that 85 percent of Americans do not own a passport. He was probably correct, but he obviously did not understand the reason for this. If the people in Chichester want to go to the beach, they go to the south of France; and of course they need a passport. The distance is about 300 miles. If we want to go to the beach, we can go to Virginia Beach, the Carolina Beaches, or Myrtle Beach. These are distances of 200 or 300 miles also, but we do not need a passport.
The twenty-first century will see a global economy. Every country must be aware of this, and students must be taught how to deal with other cultures. Americans have a great advantage when dealing with businesses in the EC. Germany, France, and the others have fought two bloody wars during the twentieth century; they do not always trust or like each other. Many of them would be more willing to deal with Americans if we had our people trained to do business in Europe. To preserve our economy and our high standard of living, we must study other nations, their histories, economics, and accounting systems so that we can carry on intelligent business practices. We cannot wait to do this--we must start now.
Sallie D. Branscom is an associate professor of accounting at Virginia Western Community College in Roanoke where she has taught for 17 years. She is a Chancellor's Commonwealth Professor for 1991-92, and she received a grant from Virginia Western for international study in 1990.