Objective of Accounting Education: Moral or Skills?

This study was carried out to identify the respondents' preferred objective of accounting programme, especially for public universities as compared to National Philosophy of Education (NPE). This study also attempted to suggest the improvement needed in objective setting for undergraduate accounting programme. The study relied on primary data obtained from reviews of documents and interviews involving a total of 28 accounting lecturers from four (4) selected Malaysian public universities, namely, Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM), National University of Malaysia (UKM), University of Malaya (UM) and International Islamic University of Malaysia (IIUM). The results suggested that most public universities involved in this study formally expressed their commitment towards academics excellent (material part) in their vision and mission. In contrast, the same universities did not seem to indicate formal commitment toward developing their students' spiritual part as required by NPE. However, accounting lecturers at public universities involved in this study seemed to agree with NPE that the development of students' moral should be set the as the primary objective of the accounting programme. Several respondents, especially Muslims, suggested that the objective of accounting programme should be based on the Islamic framework. In addition, they further suggested that the accounting programme for undergraduates should reduce the technical part and include more trainings that emphasise on the ability to be a thinker. This paper extends the accounting and education literature related to the accounting profession since it analyses the issues revolving around the objective of accounting programme, with specific reference to the Malaysian context.