An Analysis of the Turkish Accounting Education Symposiums: Influential Meetings on Accounting Education and Practice in Turkey

Year 2017, Issue: 12 - Issue: 12, 121 - 156, 01.01.2017

Masum Türker İpek Türker Muhsin Aslan

Abstract

Accounting education symposiums organized by the Turkish academia have a significant impact on the Turkish accounting education. Particularly, developments in accounting education in the last quarter of the 20th century have been mainly affected by these symposiums.Turkish Accounting Education Symposiums are the national academic meetings of accounting academicians, as well as being cultural events. They began in the second half of the 20th century and have been organized annually. After the 1982 University Reform, with the spread of large universities all around the Turkey, accounting education became widespread and consequently the number of accounting academics increased. The need for a common meet ingfor academicians was the primary factor ensuring the development and continuity of the Turkish Accounting Education Symposiums.The second factor accelerating the interest in the symposiums, is the introduction of the uniform chart of accounts in Turkey in 1994. This development enriched the- This paper is presented at the 14th World Congress of Accounting Historians in Pescara, Italy on June 25-27, 2016. discussions in the symposiums. Addressing the issues attracted more people and allowing discussions in different issues in each symposium provided high interest in these meetings. In this paper, the symposiums are analysed in three periods. The first period is the initiating period between 1979 and 1991. The topics discussed in this initial period were basically on determining the situation of accounting education in Turkey. The second period is between 1991 and 2004, and the topics on education and practice relationships were primarily discussed at the symposiums in this period. In this period topics such as improving the quality of accounting education, the impacts of globalization on education, and ethical issues in accounting were also discussed in the symposiums. The third period is between 2005 and 2015. In the third period, International Accounting Standards / International Financial Reporting Standards, International Standards on Auditing, newly adopted Turkish Commercial Code, and the effects of the standards and laws on the accounting system were widely discussed. Changes in accounting education with the use of technology and information systems to comply with the requirements of the information era, and onwards, were also discussed during this period. Turkish Accounting Education Symposiums can be summarized as an influential meeting place for accounting academicians in Turkey helping to update knowledge in new issues, to develop the accounting curriculums in the universities with new topics, and to improve the overall quality of accounting education in Turkey.

Keywords

Accounting education, Symposium, Turkey.