Using the Internet, access the SEC 10-K annual report for a publically traded company of your choice. The company must have inventory and accounts receivable (it cannot be Wal-Mart or a service company). Review the company's MD&A as well as the financial statements and the accompanying footnotes. Use this information to prepare your "analytical" results. You may wish to seek additional background and comparative data on the business. Yahoo Finance has a "competitors" feature we will discuss in class.
Your final paper should briefly describe your assessment of the firm's activities and plans for the future. The content of your paper should focus on accounting issues and include words used in our accounting class, including financial accounting as well as managerial accounting. An example would be a discussion on inventory: how is it valued, is there a WIP account, and other details you learned this semester.
You are also to access "news" about the company. Again you can find this at Yahoo Finance and we will discuss this in class. As you are required to use sources other than the textbook, including but not limited to Web sites, you must cite all your sources in a bibliography and use proper footnote techniques. Refer to the Online Guide to Writing and Research at http://www.umuc.edu/prog/ugp/ewp_writingcenter/writinggde/ for documentation requirements.
This paper is your opportunity to present your understanding of the financial and managerial accounting concepts covered in this course. Interpreting data is useful to managers. All too often managers are overwhelmed with too many facts and figures. What they need are insightful employees who can interpret this data in a meaningful fashion. One good way to show this is to "present" the financial information, explaining what the various financial statements "show" in words. Questions on this project should be addressed during class so we, as a group, can learn from each other.
You must 'write' your paper. A paper filled with 'quotes' and presentations of exact copy from the SEC 10-k or Internet or other articles does not allow you to display your mastery of the ACCT 301 subject matter. Your paper should tell the story of your company in terms of accounting, in your words. You may properly display information, cited in APA format, but the best papers feature words that demonstrate, by the student, an understanding on accounting topics as presented in ACCT 301.
Objective of Project
The paper should show your comprehension of some of the concepts and terms that were discussed in this course.
Clarification of Issues
We will not have a sample paper. Often in business you need to prepare a report but are not given a sample. We will discuss in class and our conferences will ask you to consider your SEC 10-K company as you seek to relate textbook topics to your real world example (your SEC 10-K company).
Many students will use the SEC 10-K report for a manufacturing company. Other industries and source documents are possible. The SEC 10-K is often the easiest. The key is to relate topics from our course to real world examples. The use of company and industry data generally create a good story!
The paper should be 5 - 8 pages in length (excluding the title page and bibliography which are both required), single spaced, with double spacing between paragraphs. Use headings (similar to our syllabus presentation here). Use APA style for in text citations and a reference list.