This work analyzes how accounting education is a key issue to enrich our profession through the changes that are being made in light of the adoption of international accounting standards.
As a result of past events regarding the theoretical - normative constructs in accounting matters, it will be revealed how adoption is the best system to achieve true progress in our discipline as a science and as a profession.
Education: key issue to start the change.
Surrounded by a globalized world in which the inevitable passage of transformations has generated new scenarios in which it is now imperative to function, we are immersed in the urgent need to get on the train of change and march forward.
As the world changed, accounting had to change.
And it is not free that set of changes that are taking place in this discipline because, after all, it is the language of business. And if the world and business change, accounting has to change.
And they will continue to do so in the future; This is why the accounting profession cannot afford to be isolated from these current processes, where it is necessary to be aware of it to maintain its relevance.
We are part of a profession with multiple opportunities for action and development. A profession with a future, where social needs are rapidly increasing in the field of our domain.
But a profession with a huge flaw in its foundations, that is, in its educational structure. And there is his Achilles heel, which reduces his competitive capacity.
The subject of education is relatively new to the accounting profession. Not because it is an ignorant profession, but because it has given more importance to training and professional practice, often neglecting the process of searching, accumulating and analyzing their own knowledge.
However, it is a subject that has become an imperative and that it has timidly begun to address, because it has understood that it is in education that its future survival lies and the only guarantee to face the demanding world of tomorrow, where if They have a firm foundation not only of accounting knowledge but also of knowledge of languages such as English, computers and the Internet (where today they do not generate added value because they are tools that are very necessary and managed by everyone) we can face without fear to change because we will have the necessary expertise to do it and thus understand that the world has already evolved from the industrial age focused on legal, professional and technical standards to a completely different one, the computer age, where the demands are knowledge,technology and information. (1)
Because of the aforementioned, accounting learning must be guided by the premise "learn to learn" to be willing to accept the change. It is oriented in three directions: a) processes, b) knowledge and skills, and c) orientation. (2)
- a) The process of accounting education
The learning process should focus on developing the ability to identify problems, perceive opportunities, investigate the desired information, analyze and interpret it, and obtain a reasoned conclusion among different possible alternatives.
- b) Knowledge and skills
A foundation must be created on which continuous learning is built. Developing both an understanding of fundamental concepts and the skills to apply and adapt them in a variety of situations.
- c) Orientation and professional attitude
Those involved in accounting learning should be active agents within it, identify with the profession and be involved in the development of knowledge and skills that enrich the profession.
They should also understand the nature of professional ethics and be able to make value-based judgments and seek satisfactory results with integrity.
Overcome the structural flaws of our profession we are engaged in the search for their well-being, opening new ways to strengthen it and reactivate it in a changing world that cries out for it.
Adoption of international standards: the true and only sensible, practical and quick option to solve our problems.
Today in the country the issue of whether or not to adopt international accounting, accounting and auditing standards is being debated; This has been an arduous process that has listened to multiple feelings in favor or against it, arguments that have a nationalist character and not logical reasoning that provides real reasons to decline the proposal, time has been spent searching for inappropriate, ineffective, and long-term, instead of emphasizing efforts to find the best ways to successfully achieve the adoption of these standards in our country.
The implementation of international accounting standards is the most sensible, practical and quick option to solve our problems, since everyone playing with the same rules of the game opens the doors for efficient and transparent markets that move. according to the needs of the world environment, moving away from the already very used political solutions that have an eminently legalistic character that the only thing that they bring as a consequence is leaving us locked up and dead for the world.
It is time for accounting to be redirected along the good paths of development and the future, both in its practical approach and in its scientific nature, ceasing to be a tool of the other disciplines that manage and regulate it at will.
This is one of the problems that most affects our profession, but this is only the most palpable consequence that accounting education in our country produces accountants happy to meet the demands that previously have imposed on us for the application of our discipline., which does not allow this advance by its own means looking for the most satisfactory way to develop.
If we look at our past we can find how harmonizing accounting processes have been experienced in the country that have not brought anything good, since they have tried to copy half-heartedly, regulations of another country that of course respond to the needs of those environments and not to Our own, for this reason, it is necessary to fully adopt the set of international standards since they contemplate an international environment with changing situations suitable to respond to agreements such as the FTAA and the FTA with height and capacity.
The adoption of international accounting standards is a process that must take place without opposition since it will bring about a real change by forcing the revolutionizing of our entire environment, from educational training to the way of managing business, among opponents of this process. There are all those accountants reluctant to change who are accustomed to handling everything from the perspective of practice and not from the detailed study of their work, since national regulations allow it, since our accounting is nothing more than a comfortable technique of the tax requirements and those who use it do so mainly for simple formality to comply with them; For this reason, they reject adoption, moreover, they do not even consider it as an option, since when it is carried out,they would have to go out to educate themselves and soak up all the things that the practice does not provide them, they would have to specialize in this international regulation for its subsequent application, that is, the biggest opponent of adoption are all the sectors that refuse to change, among these, the accounting professionals and their laziness to have to look for the instructional contents to which in their professional practice they have not had to resort.accounting professionals and their laziness in having to search for the instructional contents to which they have not had to resort in their professional practice.accounting professionals and their laziness in having to search for the instructional contents to which they have not had to resort in their professional practice.
A very worrying aspect for the accounting profession is its survival for the future. Accountants are running out of a profession because this is not very attractive to the market for potential students due to the management given by the other disciplines that take it as an accessory technique without value in the individual sense, because the accounting continues to be taught as it was done for many years ago without any modification other than that necessary to respond to the impositions in tax matters; accounting professionals do not want to specialize in accounting since this does not generate added value as if other types of specializations do, such as finance; how we can indirectly observe the adoption of international standards gives life to the accounting profession,since as it has been previously exposed, it forces to resort to updating and specialization and not only once, but on the contrary to a constant specialization of professionals for the development of their practice because these standards move according to the conditions and situations in the international environment, that is, adoption not only gives life to the profession for a moment, but also ensures an excellent future for the future.it ensures an excellent future for the future.it ensures an excellent future for the future.
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