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| Reviewed: |
Apr 20, 2004 by Business Editorial Board |
| Overview: |
Financial Analysis Outline is a very complete framework for a course project on financial statement analysis. Students are asked to study a publicly held company in order to advise investors and creditors about the company's future prospects. Each segment of the assignment includes suggested library and electronic sites for use in conducting research. |
| Learning Goals: |
The primary purpose of the module is to help students learn how to analyze the financial statements of a large corporationg and use the results for decision-making. |
| Target Student Population: |
This module can be used for a variety of courses and levels depending upont the depth of coverage desired. Understanding the entire assignment requires at a minimum that a student be in his/her second semester of introductory accounting. The material could also be used in an MBA course or upper-level undergraduate finance course. If used as an independent online course, the project requires a student population that is familiar with the module?s references or an adult student population with self-learning skills. |
| Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills: |
Students must have at a minimum a prerequisite knowledge of introductory accounting terms and be familiar with financial statements. Adult graduate students are likely to be successful with the online module without a full familiarity with financial statements. Users must be able to conduct library research as well as Internet searches. |
| Type of Material: |
Tutorial The module is composed of a series of fifteen assignments. The segments are not interactive and should be viewed as tutorial units. Included among the fifteen parts to the project are the following titles: 1) Overview of the Annual Report, 2) The Business Environment, 3) The Auditors, 4) SEC Form 10-K, 5) Investing Activities, 6) Debt Financing, and 7) Equity Financing. The instructor separately scores each submission with ten, fifteen, or twenty-five points as shown in the module. In its current devlivery mode, students are required to complete each part and then e-mail the instructor for an assessment of their answers. Each part requires answering three to nine questions about the company the student has chosen for their project. |
| Recommended Uses: |
Financial Analysis Online is best used as a homeword assignment which covers the majority of the term. The project appears to be intended for group work, because a susbstantial amount of research and written work is involved. The project should not be used without a textbook being assigned for the course or without a high level of assistance for students from an online instructor. Careful consideration to should be given before delivering the project solely with the use of e-mail. An interactive online classroom environment (chat room or threaded discussion) would be more suitable where students can share questions and responses. Currently,
the 1997 material needs to be updated before it can be used and each of the links needs to be checked to determine if they are still working. |
| Technical Requirements: |
Students need to be able to use a web browser and should have an e-mail address in order to communicate with the instructor. |
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| Strengths: |
As a model for someone wishing to develop a similar project, the amount of material, the content areas, and the suggested references are very good. |
| Concerns: |
The materials presented are extremely outdated. References to the ?Big Six?
auditing firms are made and the website has a 1997 copyright date. As a result one can assume the module has not been used recently. Many of the links have moved and most do not allow access. Actually only a very few of the links are operational. In addition, the library materials may not necessarily be availabla on all campuses. Another concern is that the approach to the material is not self-explanatory. As an online module, the project needs to be supplemented with a textbook and assistance from the instructor. E-mails are not be the best answer to helping students understand the concepts in this module. |
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Potential Effectiveness as a Teaching Tool |
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| Strengths: |
The module is best used as a resource or outline for instructors considering a similar undertaking. Several possible uses exist. For example, first semester accounting students could do portions of the research or upper level students could do the entire project to reinforce the idea that one needs to consider a variety of factors when analyzing a company. On the first page, the author has provided an extremely good listing of websites for student to use in their search for financial information. Material coverage within each section is, perhaps, somewhat unique to the individual instructor/text/course content. Other aspects related to the concept of a given section may be more desirable to be emphasized. |
| Concerns: |
No sumamrization is required by students. Students have evaluated the company via many financial tools and have looked at articles concerning the companies, but they haven't been asked to make an overall judgment at the very end. One of the goals of the project is "decision making" and without a final summary this objective isn't met. Students should also be required to look for both positive and negative articles concerning a company. |
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Ease of Use for Both Students and Faculty |
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| Strengths: |
Technically, the module is easy to use, as it only requires the sending of
e-mails to the online instructor and receiving e-mail assessments back. The various sectons need not necessarily be assigned in the same order as given. They can also be used as superficially or detailed as desired if the project is used as a model rather than as it currently exists. |
| Concerns: |
The value of the module depends strongly on the assessment received from the
instructor. The module?s learning value at present is tied to the student/instructor feedback given and no model for student feedback is provided.
The project cannot be used as is by other instructors. The links must be updated and the library resources investigated. For example, at the time of this review, a broken link existed on this sentence, "Your first assignment is to select a company for your project. Assume that you have narrowed the set of companies to these." |
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| Other Issues and Comments: |
This module is a good resource even if the project cannot be used as is. It provides research resources and suggested ideas that can be built upon. The project itself is not so very different from ones other instructors have constructed. However, the directions, information, and suggestions that are formally written are good reminders of the need to incorporate these features into an assignment. Frequently they are verbally stated or expected to be understood. On a final note, the author has copyrighted the module, therefore, it is up to the author to update the module. |
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