Department of Accounting

QUALIFICATIONS

Eligible to sit
for exam?

Eligible for
Certificate after
CPA exam passed?

Associates Degree

Associates Degree with 24 semester hours of accounting, 24 semester hours of business and a score of 1800 or higher on the GRE General Test.

Yes

No

Associates Degree with 24 semester hours of accounting, 24 semester hours of business and a score of 1800 or higher on the GRE General Test and four years experience.

Yes

Bachelors Degree

Bachelors Degree with 24 semester hours of accounting and 24 semester hours of business.

Yes

No

Bachelors Degree with 24 semester hours of accounting and 24 semester hours of business, a score of 1800 or higher on the GRE General Test and four years* experience.

Yes

Bachelors Degree, 150 semester hours with both 24 semester hours of accounting and 24 semester hours of business and one year of experience.

Yes

Non-business Masters Degree

Non-business Masters Degree with both 24 semester hours of accounting and 24 semester hours of business.

Yes

No

Non-business Masters Degree with both 24 semester hours of accounting and 24 semester hours of business and one year of experience.

Yes

Masters Degree in Business (MBA)

MBA with 24 semester hours of accounting OR 18 graduate level semester hours of accounting.

 Yes

No

MBA with 24 semester hours of accounting OR 18 graduate level semester hours of accounting and one year of experience.

Yes

Masters Degree in Accounting (MSA)

Masters Degree in Accounting and one year of experience.
 

Yes

No

Yes

See below for explanation of:

24 semester hours of accounting
24 semester hours of business
experience requirement
CPA exam pass rates by level of education
 

*Reduced to 2 years experience requirement if 150 semester hours completed after passing the CPA exam.
 

The 24 semester hours in accounting must include some coverage of all of the following topics:

UT Courses

 
Auditing
Financial Accounting
Information Systems
Management Accounting
Professional Ethics
Taxation

ACCT 4420, 6420
ACCT 3110, 3120, 4130, 6130
ACCT 3310, ISOM 6460
ACCT 4310, 6310, 6320
ACCT 4420, 6190
ACCT 4210, 6210, 6220, 6230

Accounting principles courses do not count toward the 24 semester hours.  The requirement is sometimes worded as requiring 30 semester hours of accounting.  The 30 semester hours refers to six hours of accounting principles and 24 semester hours of upper division accounting.  Note also that each graduate course hour (beyond principles) counts as 4/3 of an undergraduate hour; thus, 18 graduate hours are equivalent to 24 undergraduate hours.

Accounting internship credit hours count toward the 24 semester hours.

The 24 semester hours in business must include some coverage of all of the following topics:

UT Courses

 
Business Ethics
Business Organizations
Communications Skills
Economics
Group & Individual Behavior
Finance
Legal/Social Environment of Business
Marketing
Quantitative Applications in Business

BUAD 3470, MGMT 5110, PHIL 3120
BUAD 3030, MGMT 5110
COMM 3880
ECON 1150, 1200, BANS 5210
BUAD 3030, MGMT 5110
BUAD 3040, FINA 5310
BUAD 3470, MGMT 5110
BUAD 3010, MKTG 5410
BUAD 2060, 2070, OPMT 5510

The Experience Requirement is the number of years of qualified work experience required before an individual who has passed all parts of the CPA exam can receive CPA certification.  Ohio Revised Code Section 4701.06 (D)(2)(a) says that the required experience can be in any one of the following:  a public accounting firm, government, business or academia.  The experience must be "satisfactory to the (Accountancy) Board."  No interpretation is given as to what criteria are used to define "satisfactory."

The above information was drawn from the Accountancy Board of Ohio's Web Site on May 1, 2001.  For further details, go to
http://nasba.org/exams/cpaexam/ohio/
http://www.acc.ohio.gov/CPAExam.aspx

First time CPA exam pass rates by level of education (1998 and 1999 CPA exam results):

Bachelor's degree, less than 150 hours

Bachelor's degree, 150 or more hours

MBA degree

MS Accounting degree

14.1%

15.9%

24.5%

31.4%

Compiled from:  Candidate Performance on the Uniform CPA Examination, 1999 and 2000 editions.