Abstract:

Bachelor of Accounting aims to explore the potential of students to be an analyst of the business, once that they have skills as professionals to understand the accounting information systems. This paper examines the validity, reliability and cost effectiveness of including taxation on the bachelor of accounting (IFAC, 2014). Indeed, it is an interdisciplinary field in which accountants theorise aspects of taxation process (Lam et al., 2005; Martin et al., 2009; McKerchar, 2010; Oats, 2012; Boll, 2014). However, students must learn from their experiences, which allow them to revise the management actions in the future for their jobs and firms.

Indeed, this research was supported in a strong partnership between two Higher Education Institutions, such as: Guarda Polytechnic Institute (Portugal) and Presbyterian Mackenzie University (Brazil). The methodology of the research is based on collecting and reviewing accessible information about bachelor of accounting in Portugal and Brazil, in particularly
(1) the curriculum design, skills and knowledge;
(2) the integrated timetable and syllabus; and
(3) the definition of outcomes and results.

The data has been collected from the web-sites of each HEI to understand the design of the courses to assess the skills and experience to prepare students to competitive job market. This comparation was made to encourage stakeholders to focus on practical experience of the business and ensure that taxation is one of the main professional practices.

The main results show the importance of best practices on taxation as the acquisition of competences, capabilities and knowledge from general accounting aspects to particular taxation aspects (IFAC, 2014). Another result is that students are able to offer more than the primary function of accounting that is representation of accounting facts (Lowe & Koh, 2007). They may influence businesses with critical thinking reducing the litigation process with Taxation Authorities (Lennox & Li, 2014). Furthermore, the paper develops the focus of the Bachelor of Accounting to a new trend of education and globalization, because it includes the international experience of taxation that goes beyond the scope of the country of the Bachelor of Accounting and, unquestionably, promotes and increases the future perspective of the business.

Keywords:

Taxation, Accounting, Curriculum design, Portugal, Brazil.