Overview
Technology and data are creating an exciting new era for the accounting profession making now a great time to change the trajectory of your career and qualify as a professional accountant. Accounting is harnessing the power of the digital revolution that is fuelling technological trends such as cloud-based computing, artificial intelligence and robotic process automation to provide real-time finance tracking and fraud vulnerability assessments for organisations.
The Master of Professional Accounting is an ideal course for professionals seeking a career change into accounting and financial management.
You will develop professional skills sought after by industry, government and the accounting profession across accounting, finance, computer software applications, economics, statistics and business law. The Master of Professional Accounting will also allow you to choose to develop specialist skills in accounting systems and information assurance, forensic accounting, and financial data analytics meaning you will be well equipped to leverage artificial intelligence and cloud computing technologies to provide real-time finance tracking, cloud-based accounting services and fraud risk assessments for today’s business world.
With a focus on providing practical skills, you will have opportunities throughout the course to gain hands-on experience with Microsoft Excel and Access, and the world-leading SAP enterprise system software. Plus, choose a professional internship in a professional workplace to contextualise your learning and expand your networks in the industry.
Designed with flexibility in mind to suit current professionals, you can choose between online from your home country or on-campus study options. Take advantage of CQU’s three terms across the year to study the Master of Professional Accounting, when and how it suits you.
If you have an undergraduate degree in business or related disciplines including management, marketing and human resources, you may be interested in our Master of Professional Accounting Accelerated. This 12-unit masters course can be studied in as little as 18 months of full-time study.
Transcript
Professional accounting is a field that's in high demand. It's needed by every organisation, so there are a lot of opportunities.
The Master of Professional Accounting is a course designed for graduates of any discipline to achieve professional accounting qualifications.
Our Master of Professional Accounting has a set of core units plus space for two electives, and students can take electives in a number of areas, including forensic accounting, data analytics or they can take a business internship where they get the opportunity to work with a company for 10 weeks.
Internship requires them to attend a company's premises and do work for four days a week for 10 weeks in a normal term, and that's unpaid employment, but it's realistic employment.
At the same time, the student completes a research project for that company.
CQUniversity provided me with many platforms to go beyond my potential. This course provided me financial literacy, theoretical skills as well as computer skills.
Currently, I am working as an Assistant Accountant in the construction industry. This was my first accounting job in Australia, and I got promoted after a year.
The course meets the accreditation requirements for professional accounting in Australia to become a CPA or a chartered accountant.
Our staff are all doctorally qualified, including casual staff. They need to be active researchers and they are working in very applied areas including, for example, fraud detection, areas like sustainable business, sustainability reporting, so they're very applied industry relevant sort of areas.
We design our teaching approach using effectively a flipped classroom model. We use a combination of lecture recordings and workshops.
The workshops are small in size, limited to under 50 students. And, students engage in quite practical activities, applying concepts to authentic case studies and situations, and they have the opportunity to work in small teams to discuss those questions.
My advice to the students studying in university and the graduates is to upskill yourself and learn new things. Learning does not stop at university. So, if you want to get the dream job you want, work smart and work on your soft skills as well.
The future of accounting is less focused on the debit and credit bookkeeping side because that is being automated but becoming more focused on the analysis of accounting data and looking for trends and guiding businesses in making decisions.
And that's where the accounting data becomes relevant, and that's the future of accounting.
Study Experience
- Authentic Learning Experiences
- Experienced Teaching Team
- Industry Accredited
- Internships
- Seamless Pathways