Foreward
This guide does not attempt to create a standard course plan for students as we believe different students have different preferences in planning their modules. We discourage students to blindly follow and use our sample plan, because we think that you are responsible for your own future and your own learning. What this guide does is offer some advices from seniors on how you can plan your modules to enhance your learning journey and take the maximum out of your education in SMU. This guide is designed to cater specifically to Accountancy students, but we believe that the concepts illustrated can also be used to plan for other degrees.
We are not saying that you must or should follow our guide. We respect and admire people with the courage to take Corp, Income Tax and Coy Law together, and worship them when they excel. If you think you have the capacity to become a legend, go for it!
Before we Begin
Understand the requirements of your degree, be it a single major Accountancy degree, double major Accountancy degree, or a double degree in Accountancy and Business, etc.
Read up the handbook available in Oasis, and list down all the courses and categories you need to take to fulfill your degree requirements. Also take note of your course exemptions. Go to Oasis>Study>Examinations & Results>View My Exemptions/Credit Transfers to find out about your exemptions.
Think about when you wish to graduate and the time you want to spend in SMU. 3.5 years, 4 years, or more.
Steps to Planning:
For example, a single major Accountancy degree with 4 exemptions will require 32 CUs. Assuming graduation in 4 years, you will need to an average of 4 modules per semester.
Prior to 2008 intake, all year 1 modules are pre-assigned to freshmen so no particular planning is needed. From 2008 onwards, freshmen are assigned 2 modules in each of their year 1 semester, and they have to bid for the rest. In 2008 intake, BGS+FA and LTB+Business Law are assigned to students in 2 blocks.
Typical year 1 modules have the subject code XXXX10# or ACCT11# (for accounting modules), such as ACCT113, COMM101 etc. Common modules done by year 1 are:
- Calculus (pre-assigned)
- Introductory Economics (pre-assigned)
- Academic Writing (pre-assigned)
- BGS (pre-assigned)
- LTB (pre-assigned)
- Management Comms
- TWC
- Creative Thinking (1/2 CU, usually done together with Analytical Skills)
- Analytical Skills (1/2 CU, usually done together with Creative Thinking)
- Introductory Statistics
- Business Law (pre-assigned)
- Financial Accounting (pre-assigned)
Some freshmen may also consider doing the following 101 modules:
- Finance
- Management Science
- Management Accounting
- Marketing (for double degree in Business)
Most of these modules are relatively easy, although freshmen may find FA and Business Law to be more challenging than the rest. Academic writing and LTB may also be pretty time-consuming as the former requires you to write 3 reports during the term, and the latter requires you to plan a CSP project.
Simply pick and choose from the list the number modules you need to arrive at the average number of modules you need to take per semester. There is not much synergy or courses to avoid taking together in year 1.
Expect a big jump in difficulty level of modules from year 1 to year 2. The prospects of facing certain 22# modules are so daunting that many students tend to leave them for later semester, only to find these 22# modules piling up and clashing with the 33# modules. In the end, their learning process is discounted and their grades suffered in their senior years.
Instead, we strongly advise students to face the challenge early, so as to balance out the difficult modules and achieve some balance in the work flow.
For obvious reasons, these modules should be done in the following order:
- FA > Corporate Reporting > AFA
- Management Accounting > AMA
- Income Tax > Tax Planning
- GRA > Audit
- Finance > Finance Majors
- Marketing > Marketing Majors
- Management Science > OPMS Majors
- MPW > OBHR Majors
Be sure to plan the pre-requisite courses before taking the advance modules.
Core modules are not allowed to be done outside SMU. Only certain modules can be qualified to be done overseas. These courses are:
- Electives modules
- Global and Regional Studies modules (non-compulsory)
- Career Studies modules (1/2 CU non-compulsory)
- Technology and Entrepreneurship
- Majors
The list is short, so if you are planning an overseas exchange, select 3 to 5 modules from this list and "reserve" them. Overseas exchange is not allowed in the final semester, so keep that in mind and don't plan your exchange during your last semester.
Advices and remarks from seniors suggest that the following courses should be done seperately in different semesters, although there are cases of students excelling when these courses are done together.
- Income Tax and GST
- Corporate Reporting
- Accounting Theory (AT)
- Advance Financial Accounting (AFA)
Income Tax and Corporate Reporting are pre-requisite courses for the 33# modules Tax Planning and AFA respectively, so we recommend that they are done in year 2. AT and AFA can be assigned randomly into any semester in year 3 and 4.
The following modules are considered relatively difficult but still managable for students:
"Year Two modules"
- Company Law
- FIIM
- GRA
- CAT (not compulsory for accountancy degree, but a very, very useful module to take)
"Year Three/Four modules"
- Audit
- Tax Planning
- Advance Management Accounting
- Strategy
Allocate about 2-3 modules to each semester, 1-2 if you are already taking 1 of those horror modules. Note that you do not have to take all the "Year Two" modules in year 2, just remember to do GRA before Audit.
These modules can be used to buffer your semester so as to ensure that you do not face overwhelming workload. We are not saying that these modules are a no-brainer, just that they appear so much easier as compared to the horror modules. After all difficulty is a relative thing. The so-called easier modules are:
- Finishing Touch
- Ethics
- Finance
- Management Science
- Management of People at Work
- Management Accounting
- Accounting Information System
Use these modules to fill up the remaining slots to get your desired number of modules per semester.
As we have mentioned earlier, every individual is different, so you may have different preference and liking for different modules. You may want to take the following into consideration as you plan your courses:
- Synergies between the modules
- Your strength and weaknesses (if you are not the mathy type, you might want to further split up the quantitative modules)
- Likelihood of your friends joining you
- Your liking/fear of the subject
- Your double degree requirements
- Your appetite for challenges
|
- Academic Writing
- Calculus
- Introductory Economics
- General Electives x 2 |
|
- LTB
- Business Law
- Introductory Statistics
- AS/CT |
- BGS
- FA
- TWC
- Comms |
|
|
- Corporate Reporting
- GRA
- Finance
- MA |
- Income Tax
- CAT
- MS
- MPW
- Finishing Touch |
|
|
- Electives x 2
- GRS x 1
- T&E x 1 |
- Accounting Theory
- Tax Planning
- Audit |
|
|
- AFA
- AMA
- AIS
- 0.5 Career Skills |
- Company Law
- Ethics
- Strategy
- FIIM |
| Total CU: 36 CU |
|
"Corp and Tax"
"Corp, Tax and Audit"
"Corp, Tax and CAT"
"Definitely Corp, Tax, Coy Law and CAT of course"
"Corp, Tax, Audit, Coy Law, CAT"
"AFA and Tax Planning"
"AFA, Tax Planning, Accounting Theory. NEVER"
"AFA, TP, AT, Coy Law"
"AFA, TP and AMA"
FA + Stats
FA + MA
MA + Finance
Corp + Finance
AIS + GRA
Tax + Coy Law
AMA + AFA
AMA + Strategy
AMA + TP
AT + TP
TP + Income Tax
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