Program Overview

Introduction to the Master of Science in Accounting Program

The Master of Science in Accounting program is designed to help students achieve their goals in the field of accounting, whether they are considering licensure as a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) or looking to accelerate their accounting career. The program provides students with the technical accounting competencies and critical thinking skills necessary to support a successful career in all areas of accounting, including public accounting, industry, not-for-profit, government, or tax.

Program Overview

The MS Accounting degree consists of 30 required hours, plus 9 hours of prerequisites that may be waived based on prior coursework. The program offers a 4+1 option that allows current undergraduate accounting students to pursue the Master of Science degree without taking the GMAT, if they achieve a cumulative GPA of 3.00 or higher in the Intermediate series.

Accounting Prerequisites

The MS in accounting requires completion of the following accounting prerequisites, which can be completed at CU Denver after admission into the program:

• ACCT 6031: Intermediate Financial Accounting I (3 hours)
• ACCT 6032: Intermediate Financial Accounting II (3 hours)
• ACCT 6140: Fundamentals of Federal Income Tax (3 hours)

Accounting Core

The accounting core consists of 21 hours of coursework, including:

• ACCT 6020: Auditing Theory (3 hours)
• ACCT 6054: Accounting Information Systems (3 hours)
• ACCT 6150: Taxation of Business Entities (3 hours)
• ACCT 6250: Seminar: Financial Accounting (3 hours)
• ACCT 6260: Managerial Analytics for Accountants (3 hours)
• ACCT 6280: Accounting Ethics (3 hours)
• ACCT 6620: Advanced Auditing and other Assurance Services (3 hours)

Accounting Electives

Students must choose three elective courses from the following options (unless otherwise noted, all courses are 3 credit hours):

• Any ACCT 6000 course or higher
• ACCT 5939: Internship
• ACCT 6024: Advanced Financial Accounting
• ACCT 6080: Accounting for Government and Not-for-profit Organizations
• ACCT 6285: Accounting and Finance for Sustainability
• ACCT 6330: Fraud Auditing
• ACCT 6340: Financial Statement Analysis
• ACCT 6370: International Accounting
• ACCT 6400: Taxation of C Corporations and Shareholders
• ACCT 6450: Tax Research
• ACCT 6480: Partnership Taxation
• ACCT 6510: Data Analytics and Artificial Intelligence for Accountants
• ACCT 6520: Oil and Gas Accounting and Sustainability

Note

Some courses in the MS Accounting program require the use of business applications that are optimized for the Windows operating system. To ensure a seamless learning experience, MS Accounting students are strongly advised to have access to a computer that runs the Windows operating system. Students using computers with the MAC operating system will be responsible for modifying their operating system so that it can run the required business applications for the course.