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This article was downloaded by: [131.118.229.7]On: 29 March 2012, At: 07:59Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK
Journal of Educat ion for BusinessPublication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information:http:/ / www.t andfonline.com/ loi/ vjeb20
Student Academic Performance in UndergraduateManagerial-Accounting CoursesAbdulrahman Ali Al-Twaij ry
a
aQassim University, Qassim, Al-Melaida, Saudi Arabia
Available onl ine: 13 Feb 2011
To cite this art icle: Abdulrahman Ali Al-Twaij ry (2010): Student Academic Performance in Undergraduate Managerial-Accounti ng Courses, Journal of Educat ion for Business, 85:6, 311-322
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JOURNAL OF EDUCATION FOR BUSINESS, 85: 311322, 2010
Copyright C Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
ISSN: 0833-2323
DOI: 10.1080/08832320903449584
Student Academic Performance in Undergraduate
Managerial-Accounting Courses
Abdulrahman Ali Al-Twaijry
Qassim University, Qassim, Al-Melaida, Saudi Arabia
The authors purpose was to identify potential factors possibly affecting student performance
in three sequential management-accounting courses: Managerial Accounting (MA), Cost Ac-
counting (CA), and Advanced Managerial Accounting (AMA) within the Saudi Arabian con-
text. The sample, which was used to test the developed hypotheses, included 312 students
whose performance was followed throughout 3 semesters (4, 6, and 8) out of 8. Techniques of
mean comparison and correlation were employed. The results suggest that the preuniversity
accounting background was only found to have significant impact on the AMA course whereas
skill in mathematics was found to affect student performance significantly in the MA course.
It was evidenced that student performance in the MA course and overall was significantly
affected by preuniversity ability, general undergraduate academic capability, and matriculation
year. Student performance in the Financial Accounting course significantly correlated with
performance in the subsequent MA and AMA courses. There is also evidence of a significant
relationship between MA student performance and that of both CA and AMA. The findings of
this study confirmed that the load of weekly registered hours has no negative impact on the stu-
dent performance. It also suggested that accounting students had outperformed nonaccounting
students in accounting and nonaccounting courses.
Keywords: accounting, student performance, undergraduate
Accounting education has received much attention from re-searchers in developed nations. A great many studies have
been directed towards accounting education and how it might
be enhanced. However, the research on accounting education
in developing countries is still far behind. Their education
systems are affected by various factors (i.e., culture, politics,
and social factors) and this means that results from account-
ing education studies can not be always applied to different
nations because each has unique features. The education sys-
tem in Saudi Arabia differs widely from western education
systems in terms of teaching styles and program types, vol-
umes, and content.
As is the case with many accounting and business depart-
ments and schools worldwide facing the problem of weak
student academic performance (cf. Gayle & Michael, 1999;
Lane & Porch, 2002; Shotweel, 1999), the Accounting De-
partment at Qassim University in Saudi Arabia has encoun-
tered a severe challenge with its students. During the 15-year
Correspondence should be addressed to Abdulrahman Ali Al-Twaijry,
Qassim University, Accounting Department, Qassim, Al-Melaida 6633,
Saudi Arabia. E-mail: [email protected]
period from 1990 to 2005, the number of accounting stu-dents whose overall GPA was 4.00 or more out of 5.00 was
fewer than 100 students (less than 10%). A great majority
of accounting students find it rather difficult to understand
managerial accounting courses, and a high percentage (av-
erage 3550%) of students fail in management accounting
courses. As noted by Gracia and Jenkins (2002), academic
failures have huge consequences, both emotionally and finan-
cially. The reasons for these failures need to be understood
and appropriate remedies applied.
One possible reason that makes failures in managerial ac-
counting courses different from those in financial accounting
and other business courses is that the managerial courses
are not straightforward. They need critical thinking and a
good background, especially in mathematics, and this war-
rants further research to suggest ways for improving the stu-
dent performance in these courses in particular, and account-
ing programs more generally. Therefore, the question beg-
ging an answer is which factors affect student performance
in Managerial Accounting (MA) courses and whether they
are different from those affecting performance in Financial
Accounting (FA) courses as suggested by previous studies.
Because no research was found to tackle this issue within
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312 A. A. AL-TWAIJRY
the Arabian environment, a gap exists in the literature. This
study, however, endeavors to identify the potential factors
that may have some effect on student performance generally,
and particularly in three sequential management-accounting
courses. These undergraduate courses are: MA in the second
year (fourth semester), Cost Accounting (CA) in the third
year (sixth semester), and Advanced Managerial Accounting
(AMA) in the fourth year (eighth and final semester). The
outcomes of this study have field implications and applica-
tions to help enhance student performance generally and for
these courses specifically.
Background of Saudi Arabia BusinessEducational System
The Saudi Arabian business educational system, although
originally imported from the United States, is somewhat dif-
ferent from those in the West. Public business education in
Saudi Arabia, which represents about 80% of the industry
and is only available for Saudis, is free with the government
paying each student up to 1000 SR per month. Even thoughbusiness education is available for both men and women,
they are separated from each other. Students admitted to the
business schools must have a high school degree with an
acceptable GPA (normally above 70%).
The average undergraduate student stay at university is 4
years, in which an average of 140 hr (about 4045% of them
within the student major) must be studied and passed. Both
Arabic and English are used as a medium of instruction. As
for textbooks, they are mainly published in the West, with
most of them having been translated into Arabic. Teach-
ing styles are mostly a one-way street, which means that
the instructor does almost all the talking, and students are
the audience. Government regulations do not allow female
instructors to teach male students whereas the opposite is
possible but only through video conferencing.
A high percentage (an average of 85%) of the course
assessment is based on the examinations, and the rest (15%)
is based on homework, attendance, and projects. The passing
level is 60%, and when the student cannot get a total of 60
out of 100 points for a course, he or she must restudy the
course; there is no limit for retaking the same course as long
as the GPA is at the required level (2.00 or above out of
5.00). When the GPA goes below 2.00, the student loses his
or her stipend. When the GPA stays below 2.00 for three
(and sometimes five) sequential semesters, the student must
leave the university. In general, business students can find
jobs easily, especially those majoring in accounting.
Literature Review and Hypothesis Development
Accounting education is one of the chief subjects that has
been receiving and continues to receive great attention from
accounting researchers. Many studies have focused on how
to improve thequality of accounting education (i.e., Jackling,
2005; Kramer, Johnson, Crain, & Miller, 2005; Mustafa &
Chiang, 2006). Some research has been directed toward iden-
tifying and suggesting solutions to problems and difficulties
confronting accounting students (Booth, Luckett, & Mladen-
ovic, 1999; Davidson, Slotnick, & Waldman, 2000; Gracia &
Jenkins 2002; Lane & Porch 2002). More narrowly, several
studies concentrated on one or more undergraduate or grad-
uate accounting courses. Based on research carried out 18
years ago, Doran, Bouillon, and Smith (1991) found that the
preuniversity accounting knowledge of students negatively
affected their performance in the basic managerial account-
ing course. Although this was a surprising result, it may not
still be the case nowadays because both accounting academic
programs and preuniversity education systems have changed.
Auyeung (1991), Keef(1992), Rohde and Kavanagh (1996a),
and Lee (1999) searched for possible variables affecting stu-
dent performance in the Principles of Financial Accounting
(PFA) course. One important finding of these studies was that
the prior university accounting background and the general
academic ability had a significant impact on performance in
PFA.The impact on student performance and of various en-
try paths to tertiary education in a second-year accounting
management course was assessed by Jackling and Anderson
(1998). They examined the effect of background features of
some students on their performance in the course. Jackling
and Andersons results revealed that part-time students out-
performed full-time students, and that both entry qualifica-
tions and a students general ability together can predict per-
formance in the management course. However, there was no
evidence of any significant effect of preuniversity account-
ing study, gender, or language background on the course
performance of students. On the other hand, Lane and Porch
(2002) endeavored to investigate the possible impact of back-ground factors of nonspecialist accounting students on their
performance on the UK Level One and Level Two accounting
modules. Multiple regression analysis was employed to eval-
uate the effect of various explanatory variables. The analysis
outcomes suggest that a students accounting background
does not have a significant effect on Level One and Level
Two accounting modules. More recently, Al-Twaijry (2005)
studied the potential effects of various factors on student
performance in the PFA course. The analysis of his sample
(379 students) provided evidence that the significant vari-
ables that affect the student performance in the PFA course
are: (a) the preuniversity academic achievement, (b) the pre-
university accounting background, and (c) the preuniversitymathematics attainment.
These studies have contradictory results regarding the po-
tential effect of the student accounting and general back-
ground on the introduction to accounting courses. The pos-
sible reasons for that are either the time elapsed between the
studies (some of them older than 15 years) or the cultural
and educational system differences. Because the results of
the majority of these studies supported the thesis that preuni-
versity academic ability in accounting generally has a strong
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PERFORMANCE IN MANAGERIAL ACCOUNTING COURSES 313
effect on accounting courses, the potential impact of the stu-
dent preuniversity accounting and their general background
and performance on managerial accounting courses can be
hypothesized as follows:
Hypothesis 1 (H1): The performance of Saudi Arabian
students with a preuniversity accounting acquaintance
would be significantly higher in the university manage-ment accounting courses than those without such expe-
rience.
H2: The performance of Saudi Arabian students with a higher
secondary school GPA would be significantly better
in the university management accounting courses than
those with a lower GPA.
Some research has been concerned with the students gen-
eral performance in business and management schools. For
example, Marcal and Roberts (2000), Brasfield, Harrison,
and McCoy (1993), and Allmen (1996) found that past per-
formance (i.e., at high school) was a good predictor of future
(i.e., university) performance in the fields of management,business, and economic studies. Similarly, Duff (2004) used
linear regression analyses to test the explanatory power of
students approaches to learning, their gender and age, and
their prior academic performance on the subsequent aca-
demic achievement. The analysis outcome suggested that
prior academic attainment was the strongest predicting vari-
able of accounting and business economics students first-
year academic performance. Based on these findings, the
extent of the impact of student preuniversity performance
and experience on performance at undergraduate business
schools can be tested through the following hypotheses:
H3: The performance of Saudi Arabian undergraduate busi-
ness students with a higher secondary school GPA
would be significantly better than those with a lower
GPA.
H4: The performance of Saudi Arabian undergraduate busi-
ness students who graduated from scientific high schools
would be significantly higher than those who graduated
from nonscientific high schools.
Fewer studies (i.e., Drennan & Rohde, 2002; Jackling,
Russell, & Anderson, 1994; Rohde & Kavanogh, 1996b)
have focused on managerial accounting courses. Jackling
et al. examined the influence of relaxing the condition of
the prerequisite of basic managerial accounting (basic fi-
nancial accounting) on the performance on the managerialaccounting course and the influence of a students level of
understanding English language on his or her performance
in the basic accounting courses. Their results suggest that,
under certain circumstances, waiving the prerequisite has a
negative impact on student performance. This result, how-
ever, could not be generalized. The level of understanding
English was not found to have a significant effect on the
student performance in the basic accounting courses. On the
other hand, Rohde and Kavanagh searched for the factors
affecting student performance in a course on the principles
of management accounting. The most important variable to
help predict student performance was the course grade in the
prerequisite course (Introduction to Financial Accounting).
Considering that financial accounting courses differ in many
aspects from managerial accounting courses, the effect of one
on the other is questionable. To discover if the results reached
can be confirmed or contradicted, the following hypothesis
was tested:
H5: The Saudi Arabian undergraduate students who perform
better in the financial accounting course would also per-
form significantly better in the management accounting
courses.
Drennan and Rohde (2002) studied the factors expected
to have an effect on student performance in AMA in an
Australian university. They found that the performance of
students whose mother tongue was not English in Introduc-
tion to Managerial Accounting was relatively poor whereas
their performance was good in AMA. Also, they found thatthe student performance in AMA was better for those who
studied its prerequisite at the same university than for those
who had taken the prerequisite somewhere else. The admis-
sion procedure, which was not specifically addressed in this
study, but which can be inferred from its findings, may cor-
relate with the student performance in managerial courses
and overall. In the year 2000, the acceptance procedure and
criteria changed at the School of Business to which the Ac-
counting Department belongs. To test the possible effect of
such changes on academic performance, the following hy-
pothesis was developed:
H6: The performance of Saudi Arabian business students
entering the University after the year 2000 would be
significantly higher than those who entered before the
year 2000.
Although accounting courses share some similarities, they
sometimes differ widely from each other. The relationship
between student performance in the first year accounting
courses and the following year accounting courses was in-
vestigated by Augeung (1991). The results confirm a strong
relationship between student performance in the Introduction
to Accounting course and in the advanced financial account-
ing course. To extend their analysis to examine if the re-
lation among introduction to management accounting, cost
accounting, and advanced management accounting is alsostrong, the following hypothesis was set forth:
H7: The Saudi Arabian undergraduate students who per-
form better in a managerial accounting course would
also significantly perform better in the other managerial
accounting courses.
Other researchers endeavored to identify different fac-
tors that may affect student performance in nonaccounting
courses. For example, Anderson, Benjamin, and Fuss (1994)
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Student Academic Performance
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314 A. A. AL-TWAIJRY
examined the possible impact of the students ability in math-
ematics in high school on his or her performance in the basic
economics course. They found a significant positive corre-
lation. On the other hand, in an earlier study, Ely and Hittle
(1990)could notfind such an effect of student ability in math-
ematics on the performance in the business finance course.
Because managerial accounting uses mathematics in a deeper
manner than the other accounting courses, it was expected
that students with good understanding of mathematics would
perform better in management accounting courses, and so
the following hypothesis was set forth:
H8: The SaudiArabian undergraduatestudentsachieving bet-
ter in preuniversity mathematics would perform signif-
icantly better in the university management accounting
courses than those whose achievement in mathematics
is poorer.
Mathematical ability can significantly affect graduate and
undergraduate business studies given thatmany of the courses
at business schools rely on mathematics. Based on that, thefollowing hypothesis was developed:
H9: The performance of Saudi Arabian undergraduate busi-
ness students who have done well in preuniversity math-
ematics would be significantly higher than those whose
achievement in preuniversity mathematics is poor.
Course scheduling and load could have an effect on the
student performance. The likely influence of course schedul-
ing during the week was investigated by Henebry (1997),
who focused on the financial management course. Henebrys
results show that the likelihood of passing the course when
it is scheduled for more than one meeting during the week is
higher than when if there is only one long meeting during theweek. The probability of the load effect was examined in a
recent study by Mustafa and Chiang (2006), who suggested
that course materials and course content do affect the quality
of higher education. Because the time and load of the course
are expected to affect performance in the course, also time
and load of all other courses, which can be measured by the
number of registered hours, are expected to negatively affect
the individual courses and overall performance. That is be-
cause a high load means less time available for homework
and examination preparation for individual courses and vice
versa. Based on this, the following hypotheses were devel-
oped:
H10: Saudi Arabian undergraduate students with a small load
would perform significantly better in the university man-
agement accounting courses as compared to those with
a large load.
H11: The performance of Saudi Arabian undergraduate busi-
ness students with a small load would be significantly
higher as compared to those with a large load.
Other factors, such as class size, course problems, atten-
dance, student personality, and instructors attributes, could
have an effect on a university students academic perfor-
mance. Naser and Peel (1998) found out that the class size,
the instructors character and personality, the students effort,
and the course problems are the factors most influencing stu-
dent performance in the Introduction to Accounting course.
Paisey and Paisey (2004) identified potential causes behind
student absences from classes and found a strong positive
relationship between student attendance and performance in
an accounting module. The possible effect of a students
personality was studied by Nguyen, Allen, and Fraccastoro
(2005). They used data of 368 undergraduate and graduate
students of a university business course. Anxiety was found
to be positively and significantly predicting overall GPA,
whereas the other personality characteristics such as agree-
ableness, extroversion, emotionality, and intellect had some
impact on the final course grade and overall GPA. The influ-
ence of emotionality and intellect, however, depended on the
students gender. Mustafa and Chiang (2006) endeavored to
identify the quality dimensions in higher education and how
they were related to instructor ability and attitudes, coursematerial, and load and the amount of knowledge provided.
The results, which were based on analyzing 485 question-
naires, suggest that the key factors affecting the quality of
higher education are teacher ability and attitude. The mean
comparison analysis showed that students with a high GPA
perceive course content to be more important for enhancing
education quality, whereas the students with low GPAs per-
ceived that a teachers superior performance enhanced course
content.
Although the literature on this subject has highlighted
various factors affecting student performance either in a par-
ticular course or in general, other factors that may affect
performance in accounting studies were not discussed. Theterm load, the type of high school, the term length and the
student major are further factors that have the potential to
have an impact on accounting student performance, and they
need to be investigated. These variables are addressed and
discussed in this study.
DATA COLLECTION AND DESCRIPTIVEANALYSIS
The sample used in this study (312 students) was randomly
selected from students registering during the academic years
2000, 2001, and 2002. These particular years were chosenbecause, as the normal stay at the university is 4 years, those
students should have graduated, and they would have studied
all three courses. The data sample was collected from the
students present and permanent files kept in the university
registration system, to which I was given access, through
two steps. First, the data regarding the university academic
performance was gathered from the students present files,
files which contain information about the students academic
transcripts, all semesters details, such as registered hours,
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PERFORMANCE IN MANAGERIAL ACCOUNTING COURSES 315
TABLE 1
Number of Students Who Either Received or
Did Not Receive a Grade in the Course
Status MA CA AMA
Received a grade 219 187 90
Did not receive a grade 93 125 222
Total sample 312 312 312
Note. Students who did not receive a grade either dropped the
course or had chosen different major (other than accounting) or left
the university.
passed hours, term GPA, overall GPA, and specialization.
Second, the other data were collected from the students
permanent files, files that contain preuniversity information
such as high school transcripts, date of birth, addresses, and
special needs. Table 1 shows the number of students in the
sample who received a grade in the management accounting
courses.
TheMA courseis in Level 4 (second year),and allstudents
in the college must take and pass it. A high percentage (30%
= 93 students) did not receive a grade in that course, which
means that nearly one third of the students in Level 4 had left
the university (withdrawal or dismissal). The CA course is in
Level 6 (third year) and must be taken by business students
in addition to accounting students. The number of students
who received a grade in the CA course was 187 whereas 125
(40%) did not get a grade in the course, which means that 30
(12593) students (10%) had left the college during their
third year. The AMA course is in Level 8, the last semester
(in the fourth year) and taken only by accounting students.
The total number of students in the sample who graduated inaccounting was only ninety students. Table 2 represents the
number and percentage of the sample students in each grade.
Very few students (< 2%) received an A+ or A in the MA
course, and even fewer (1.6%) in the CA course. Nobody
received an A+ or A in the AMA course. The number of
students who got a B (4 points) or more is 6 (6.4%) in the
MA course, 5 (5.9%) in the CA course, and 2 (2.2%) in the
AMA course. The vast majority of the students who passed
the courses (MA, CA, AMA) received between a D and
C+. On the other hand, 88 students (40%) failed the MA
course, 55 students (29%) failed the CA course, and fewer
(22%) failed the AMA course. This data may suggest that
the performance of students in the management courses did
not follow a normal distribution.
By looking at the term GPA and the overall GPA of the
sample, which is illustrated in Table 3, it is noticeable that
very few students got a GPA of 4.0 or over (between 1% and
3% in all cases). The great majority of the students (between
35% and 72%) had a GPA lower than 2.5. According to the
university rules, a student with an overall GPA lower than
2.00 gets a warning and if the student could not improve his
or her overall GPA to 2.00 or more for a number of terms
(normally three), the student would be asked to leave the
university. The percentage of those students who were at risk
of being dismissed was 18% in Year 2, 5% in Year 3, and
1% in Year 4. Looking at the term performance, I noticed
substantial development because in Term 4 more than 60%of the sample students had an overall GPA lower than 2.5,
but in Term 8 more than 60% of the sample students had
an overall GPA higher than 2.5. One possible reason of this
is that the more time (terms) a student spends at university,
the better the student understands and the better the student
performs because, with time, the student gets used to the
culture, system, and teaching style of the university, and he
or she also is more mature.
Statistical Analysis and Hypothesis Testing
The hypotheses used in this research were of the alternative
hypothesis format, which suggest an existence of an effect orrelationship between variables. Such an effect or relationship
was examined, and, if the hypothesis is proven, it would
be possible to improve the academic performance by the
affecting variables. The most widely used measurement of
the students future academic performance was his or her
past accomplishment. Normally, students with backgrounds
in a subject are expected to do better than others with no
TABLE 2
Number and Percentage of Students in Each Grade
Course Grade MA (n = 219) CA (n = 187) AMA (n = 90)
Symbol Points Frequency % Frequency % Frequency %
A+ 5 1 0.5 0 0.0 0 0.0
A 4.75 3 1.4 3 1.6 0 0.0
B+ 4.5 4 1.8 3 1.6 1 1.1
B 4 6 2.7 5 2.7 1 1.1
C+ 3.5 16 7.3 3 1.6 5 5.6
C 3 19 8.7 16 8.6 17 18.9
D+ 2.5 25 11.4 21 11.2 19 21.1
D 2 57 26.0 81 43.3 27 30.0
F 1 88 40.2 55 29.4 20 22.2
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316 A. A. AL-TWAIJRY
TABLE 3
Student Term and Overall Performance During the Three Academic Terms
MA (n = 219) CA (n = 187) AMA (n = 90)
Term GPA Overall GPA Term GPA Overall GPA Term GPA Overall GPA
n % n % n % n % n % n % Grade
4 2 3 1 6 3 1 1 2 2 1 1 4.0
41 19 14 6 33 18 17 9 27 30 15 17 3.03.99
40 18 43 20 60 32 48 26 29 32 30 33 2.52.99
66 30 119 54 40 21 111 59 19 21 43 48 2.02.49
68 31 40 19 48 26 10 5 13 14 1 1 < 2.00
background. To examine this case in managerial accounting,
I divided the sample into students who had studied at least
one accounting course at high school and those who had not.
The mean comparison results are disclosed in Table 4.
Students with preuniversity accounting backgrounds per-
formed slightly better (not significantly) in the MA course,
and this, to some extent, contradicts the findings of Doran etal.(1991) andthoseof Al-Twaijry (2005), but they areconsis-
tent with those of Jackling and Anderson (1998). However,
in the CA course, students without such backgrounds per-
formed slightly better (not significantly). On the other hand,
students who had some experience in accounting before uni-
versity did significantly (p .20) effect of
the preuniversity accounting background on term and over-
all GPA. It seems that, although preuniversity accounting
backgrounds may help students understand some topics in
accounting, it is not very helpful, and so it may not be con-
sidered as an influencing factor on overall performance inundergraduate accounting.
On the other hand, students who do well at high school
are also expected to do well at university. To find out to what
extent this was true, I compared the performance of students
with a high school grade of 77.5 or higher to those with a
grade lower than 77.5. This specific point was chosen be-
cause, normally, the high school grades of students admitted
to thebusiness school at QassimUniversityrange between 70
and 85, with an average of 77.5. Table 5 reveals the statistical
analysis.
Students who performed better before university did sig-
nificantly better (p
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PERFORMANCE IN MANAGERIAL ACCOUNTING COURSES 317
TABLE 5
Course Mean Comparison Using a 77.5 High School Grade Cut-Off Point
Course Grade (%) n M SD t Sig. (2-tailed)
MA 77.50 105 2.138 1.052 2.585 .011
< 77.50 86 1.770 0.880
CA 77.50 92 2.073 0.816 1.594 .113
< 77.50 71 1.866 0.832AMA 77.50 49 2.194 0.783 0.548 .586
< 77.50 32 2.094 0.837
language. To examine to what extent the type of high school
may affect undergraduate business student performance, we
used ttest, the results of which shows that there were no sig-
nificant differences (p>.25 in terms and overall) in the GPAs
between students from scientific high schools and those from
other high schools. Thus H4 must be rejected. At present, the
Business College at Qassim University prefers students form
scientific high schools to others, but as these findings sug-
gest, the school type should not be considered as a dominantfactor influencing the admission decision. On the other hand,
the admissionminimum acceptance level of high school GPA
should be increased.
Probably, management accounting courses use mathemat-
icsmore than financial accounting, andso students with a bet-
ter understanding (i.e., higher grades) of mathematics were
expected to do better in these three management courses
(MA, CA, and AMA). Using the mean comparison of grade
in the course between students with a grade in mathematics
equal to 65 (the average grade of the sample students) or
more and others with less than 65 in mathematics, the only
significant (p = .07) difference in means was found in the
MA course, and so we do not reject H8 for the MA course.This result is consistent with Al-Twaijrys (2005) findings
regarding the effect of mathematics achievement on the stu-
dent performance in financial accounting. In the other two
courses (CA and AMA), and also in the term and overall
GPA, student mathematics skill had no significant effect on
his performance. As a result, H8 for CA and AMA and also
H9 cannot be accepted. A possible reason behind the non-
significant effect of the preuniversity mathematics capabil-
ity on the school of business student performance, although
mathematics is used in most of the courses, is either that
mathematics content or teaching technique is different.
Development in higher education is dynamic. Admission
procedures, course contents, and syllabi change over time.
To examine whether the changes introduced in the year 2000helped students in their academic performance and achieve
better grades, we compared the performance (measured by
course grade, passed hours, and GPA) for students enrolled
at the college before the academic year 2000 and those who
enrolled either in year 2000 or after. Table 7 shows the Mann-
Whitney U results.
Students entering the university in the year 2000 or later
performed significantly better (p .20) in all three terms (4, 6, 8). The term GPA was
better for those matriculating in the year 2000 or later, but
the mean differences were not significant except at the 15%
level for Terms 4 and 8 and not significant at all for Term 6.
Therefore, H6 must be rejected for term performance. On the
TABLE 6
Term and Overall GPAs Means Comparison Using a 77.5 High School Grade Cutoff Point
Course Grade (%) n M SD t Sig. (2-tailed)
Term 4 GPA 77.50 105 2.421 0.718 1.899 .059
< 77.50 86 2.223 0.714Term 6 GPA 77.50 92 2.511 0.668 1.320 .189
< 77.50 71 2.377 0.612
Term 8 GPA 77.50 49 2.696 0.649 1.393 .168
< 77.50 32 2.503 0.545
Overall GPA (Term 4) 77.50 105 2.463 0.476 2.955 .004
< 77.50 86 2.271 0.410
Overall GPA (Term 6) 77.50 92 2.540 0.408 2.889 .004
< 77.50 71 2.362 0.366
Overall GPA (Term 8) 77.50 49 2.670 0.420 1.915 .059
< 77.50 32 2.485 0.431
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318 A. A. AL-TWAIJRY
TABLE 7
Course, Passed Hours, and GPA Means Comparison Using an Academic Year 2000 Cutoff Point
Term Course Test Course grade Passed hours Term GPA Overall GPA
Four Mean Comparison A > B A > B A > B A > B
MA Mann-Whitney U 4589.500 5120.000 4910.50 3685.00
Asymp. Sig. (2-tailed) 0.015 0.248 0.107 0.000
Six Mean Comparison A < B A > B A > B A > BCA Mann-Whitney U 4166.500 4124.500 3986.50 3068.00
Asymp. Sig. (2-tailed) 0.922 0.833 0.556 0.002
Eight Mean Comparison A < B A > B A > B A > B
AMA Mann-Whitney U 934.500 986.000 804.50 756.00
Asymp. Sig. (2-tailed) 0.560 0.879 0.105 0.044
A = entered the college on or after the year 2000, B = entered college before year 2000.
other hand, students enrolled in the year 2000 or later gen-
erally (overall GPA) performed significantly better (p
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PERFORMANCE IN MANAGERIAL ACCOUNTING COURSES 319
TABLE 9
Correlation Between Performance of MA, CA, and AMA
Correlations
MA CA AMA
Spearmans rho Correlation Coefficient 1.000 .200 .239
MA Sig. (2-tailed) .006 .023N 219 187 90
Correlation Coefficient .200 1.000 .179
CA Sig. (2-tailed) .006 .092
N 187 187 90
Correlation Coefficient .239 .179 1.000
AMA Sig. (2-tailed) .023 .092
N
90 90 90
Correlation is significant at the .01 level (2-tailed)Correlation is significant at the .05 level (2-tailed).
TABLE 10
Comparison Between Registered and Term Hours Passed
Term Description Min Max M SD
4 (MA; n = 219) # of hours registered in the term 5 17 13.94 3.13
# of hours passed 0 17 10.25 4.69
6 (CA; n = 187) # of hours registered in the term 5 18 15.24 2.35
# of hours passed 0 18 12.19 4.14
8 (AMA; n = 90) # of hours registered in the term 5 20 15.54 2.83
# of hours passed 0 20 13.91 4.04
with low overall GPA in order forthem to do better. To test the
effect of the number of term hours on student performance
on the three courses and whether lighter loads result in better
performance, we ran a t test, and the results are shown in
Table 11.
Forthe MA course, which is given in thesecond year,there
wasa significant difference (p.10)
between the means, and so we must rejectH10. These results,
however, contrast with what is expected from the students.
We may thus infer that students with more hours are more
conscientious than others and work harder, whereas students
with fewer hours do not care as much because they think they
can pass a few courses without having to worry too much and
subsequently they neglect their studies. Table 12 compares
the term GPA means between students with more than 15 hr
and those with equal to or fewer than 15 registered hours per
week.
From the previous mean comparison statistical analysis,
in all three terms (4, 6 8), the term GPA means of students
taking more than 15 hr were significantly better than were
those of students with fewer hours per week. In Terms 4
and 6, the difference is significant at the 1% level, but the
means differences in Term 8 are only significant at the 10%
level. These results lead us to reject H11, thus restricting
the students with a low GPA to fewer weekly registered
hours, which may not be an encouraging decision and a
better alternative should be sought.
TABLE 11Course Mean Comparison Using a 15-hr Cutoff Point
Course Registered hours n M SD t Sig. (2-tailed)
MA > 15 69 2.370 1.100 3.680 .000
15 150 1.840 0.949
CA > 15 61 2.120 0.937 1.228 .221
15 126 1.950 0.851
AMA > 15 41 2.200 0.765 0.110 .913
15 49 2.210 0.866
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Student Academic Performance
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320 A. A. AL-TWAIJRY
TABLE 12
Term GPA Mean Comparison Using a 15-hr Cutoff Point
Variable Registered hours n M SD t Sig. (2-tailed)
Term 4 GPA > 15 69 2.637 0.799 4.079 .000
15 150 2.215 0.667
Term 6 GPA > 15 61 2.793 0.528 5.031 .000
15 126 2.294 0.682Term 8 GPA > 15 41 2.812 0.597 1.93 .057
15 49 2.557 0.653
FURTHER FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
In this section more findings are presented and discussed.
The relationship between management accounting courses
and the other undergraduate courses reflects the level of con-
sistency between them. The extent of relationship between
the students performance in each of the three management
accounting courses and his general (term and all) perfor-
mance are measured by the Spearman test, the results ofwhich are shown in Table 13.
Spearmans results confirm the strong, significant corre-
lations between student performance in the courses (MA,
CA, and AMA) and student performance in the other courses
(term GPA). Also, there are significant (but weaker) corre-
lations between the performance in these individual courses
and the students general performance at a university level
(overall GPA). Table 14 shows the correlation results between
four semesters. Term 3 was included because it contains FA,
and the others are Terms 4, 6, and 8.
The strongest relationships were found between student
performance in Term 6 and in Term 8 (Pearson correlation=
. 53). There were also strong relationships between the per-formance in Terms 3 and 4 (Pearson correlation = .47) and
between performance in Terms 3 and 8 (Person correlation
= .46). However, the correlation between Terms 4 and 6 was
weaker (Pearson correlation = .37). The weakest relation-
ship was between Terms 3 and 6. All these correlations are
significant at the 1% level.
TABLE 13
Correlation (Spearmans Rho) Between Course
Performance (MA, CA, and AMA)and General
Performance (Term and Overall GPA)
Course Variable Term GPA Overall GPA
MA Correlation coefficient .694 .554
Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000
n 219 219
CA Correlation coefficient .605 .357
Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000
n 187 187
AMA Correlation coefficient .637 .464
Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000
n 90 90
Two of three management accounting courses (MA and
CA) are required to be taken nonaccounting students. By
comparing the performance of accounting students to nonac-
counting students in these courses, we found that the mean
performance(grade) of accounting students in theMA course
(2.34) was significantly (p = .000) better than that of the
nonaccounting students (1.77). Also the accounting student
performance in the CA course (2.16) was significantly (p
8/2/2019 Student Academic Performance
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PERFORMANCE IN MANAGERIAL ACCOUNTING COURSES 321
TABLE 14
Correlations Between Four Semesters: Term 2 (with FA) and Terms 4, 6, and 8
Semester Correlation Term 4 GPA Term 6 GPA Term 8 GPA
Term 3 GPA Pearson correlation .47 .24 .46
Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .002 .000
n 204 174 83
Term 4 GPA Pearson correlation .37 .41Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000
n 187 90
Term 6 GPA Pearson correlation .53
Sig. (2-tailed) .000
n 90
terms (2.11). In the CA course, there were no significant
(p >.30) differences, either in the course performance or in
the term GPA. Nevertheless, a significant difference exists
when examining the results for the AMA course. Students
who studied AMA in normal terms performed better (2.27)
than those who had taken the course in summer term (1.20).
In fact, 4 out of 5 (80%) students who studied AMA in the
summer term failed in the course. The general performance
in all term courses (Term GPA) was significantly (p = .086)
higher in the normal terms. One probable reason of the weak
performance in the summer term is the level of absence, and
this, as reported by Paisey and Paisey (2004), has a negative
influence on academic performance. From these results, we
conclude that it would be better not to offer AMA in the
summer term. Otherwise, the absenteeism problem must be
resolved. The case is, however, more flexible in the MA and
CA courses. In other words, there must be a careful selection
of the courses that can be offered during summer semester,
course with which the students can cope.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
Many problems are associated with weak student perfor-
mance at the university level. To eliminate such problems, a
sufficient amount of research must be undertaken to uncover
ways to enhance student academic performance. However,
in the present study, we have attempted to identify factors
which may affect accounting student performance in Saudi
Arabia, mainly in the management accounting courses as
well as more generally. Student performance in management
accounting courses was very weak. The failing percentagegoes up to 50%, and the great majority of students (up to
80%) who passed the course(s), got low marks (D to C). In
terms of general performance (term and overall GPA), over
60% of the sampled students had a GPA lower than 2.50 in
Term 4. Although this percentage has improved when going
to the higher level (Terms 6 and 8), it is still high (4550%).
There was evidence of a significant effect of preuniversity
academic ability on the MA course and on overall perfor-
mance. The preuniversity accounting background was only
found to have significant impact on theAMA course, whereas
the preuniversity mathematics ability was found to signifi-
cantly affect student performance in the MA course. How-
ever, no effects related to the type of high school were de-
tected on the student undergraduate performance. Student
performance in the Financial Accounting course did signif-
icantly correlate to the performance in the subsequent MA
and AMA courses, but its correlation to the CA was weak.
There is also evidence of a significant relationship between
the student performance in the MA course and performance
in both CM and AMA, but the correlation between CA and
AMA was weaker. On the other hand, it was evidenced that
students with a better performance in the MA, CA, and AMA
also performed significantly better in the other term courses
and in the university courses more generally. Moreover, the
analysis of the research shows that student performances in
Terms 3, 4, 6, and 8 are significantly correlated, emphasizing
that the strongest correlation coefficient is between Terms 6
and 8 whereas the weakest coefficient exists between Terms
3 and 6.
The number of weekly registered hours was expected to
have a negative impact on the student performance, but, in
fact, it did not. The results of the MA course and Term 4 GPA
were amazing because a significant positive relation existed
between performance and the number of registered hours. On
the other hand, it was evident that students who entered the
university in the year 2000 or later performed significantly
betterin theMA courseand overall.The comparison between
accounting and nonaccounting student performance proved
that accounting students had outperformed nonaccounting
students even in the nonaccounting courses. Moreover, the
performance comparison between normal terms and summerterms confirmed that, in general, students perform better in
normal terms.
Based on these findings, we suggest that high school
student selection criteria should concentrate more on high
school performance, and more attention should be placed
on the undergraduate new students and introductory courses.
Relaxing the restriction on the number of weekly hours for
which students with lower GPA can register might enhance
term performance. The accounting curriculum and course
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