Peer Review

System of Investor Protection

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Reviewed:: Aug 15, 2016 by Business

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Ratings

Overall Rating:

Content Quality:

Effectiveness:

Ease of Use:

Overview:

From the Center for Audit Quality, this module consistes of a series of 4 short animated videos: 1) Fighting Fraud, 2) The Audit Committee, 3) The Financial Staetment Audit, and 4) the System of Investor Protection.

Type of Material:

Presentation

Recommended Uses:

Educational resource to be incorporated in traditional and online classes in the form of in-class presentation/online open discussion forums and homework assignments in the area of Auditing and Financial Forensic/Fraud Investigations.

Technical Requirements:

Video veiwer

Identify Major Learning Goals:

To learn about the system of investor protection related to public companies (multiple stakeholders – the company, board of directors, internal and external auditors, regulators).
To understand the function of the audit and the role of different stakeholder in the process.
To learn the relevant terminology that is used in the audit environment.

Target Student Population:

Lower and upper division accounting and auditing courses

Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:

Accounting I/II

Content Quality

Rating:
Strengths:: Topics include elements of the fraud triangle, risk, role of the external audit, professional skepticism, whistleblowing, role of audit committee, SOX, direct access of internal audit to audit committee, risk assessment, and the PCAOB. In addition to the four videos, other useful resources can be located at the website. Content is accurate and relevant. In less than 16 minutes, the videos capture one’s interest and does much to inform the learner about auditing and related processes to protect investors.
In addition, the author provides the audience with an entertaining movie-like videos to discuss an overview of the auditing and financial forensic/fraud investigation process. The author provides excellent illustrations of financial statement fraud scenarios to masterfully discuss complex auditing and forensic concepts. Auditing and financial forensic/fraud investigation concepts are difficult to teach, and the author professionally integrates his audit experience in an engaging manner.
Concerns:: None.

Potential Effectiveness as a Teaching Tool

Rating:
Strengths:: Teachers and students could learn a lot in a short time. The author is very enthusiastic about the auditing and financial forensic/fraud investigation profession and has a very captivating voice. This easy to understand video uses an animated, sound-enhanced comic book format which is a clever way to cover auditing terminology and processes presented using appropriate terms from the audit discipline (material misstatement, evidence, assessing risk). The meaningful movie-like fraud dramatizations illustrate audit and forensic concepts nicely during the presentation. The fighting fraud video segues very naturally just prior to the audit committee video.
An interesting assignment in an auditing class would be to have teams compare and contrast similar versus new information contained within any two of the videos. While some overlap and reinforcement of ideas would exist, each video has a slightly unique focus.
Concerns:: Some terms are not identified (PCAOB). Also while the duplication of some of the concepts in multiple videos enhances retention, the lack of sequencing information for anyone that would view all four might be somewhat troublesome.

Ease of Use for Both Students and Faculty

Rating:

Strengths:

The author’s website and related educational videos are professionally done. The background music incorporated heightens the mood and tone of the video. The author creates a comfortable user-friendly, movie-like, setting interjecting practical illustrations, colorful graphics, and excellent voice depictions of various characters. Vibrant colors, multiple voices, and sound effects, like clicks and telephone ringing are appropriately timed to retain interest. Some very clever graphics and the use of humor makes watching the presentations fun.
The author has a gift for presenting complex technical material in a very simple manner.
The author also allows the audience enough time to process information being presented.
The four videos ranging from 3.5 minutes to 4.75 minutes (16 minutes in total) have been divided into workable segments. The videos would not have to be viewed in sequence. A viewer might only be interested in fraud, for example, and view only one of the videos. This form of organization allows for flexibility.

Concerns:

The order for viewing the videos is not specified, which may cause a new viewer to be uncertain as to who is who within each video. Consider since the players: CFO, audit committee chair, internal auditor, external auditor, regulators (SEC, and the PCAOB) are introduced in System of Investor Protection, it might be an appropriate starting point for the other videos.

Other Issues and Comments:: Please note that one can pause the video while it is running, although doing so is not intuitive in this interface. Pausing the video can take place, by clicking directly in the center of the screen display where when clicked, pause and play alternate between each other.
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