Accreditation or Program review activities from 2002-03 academic year.

New initiatives, activities or programs from the 2002-03 academic year.
The 2002-2003 academic year was a successful one for the accounting department at Austin Peay State University.  A number of objectives were accomplished and progress was made on several others.

One of the areas where improvement occurred was in faculty staffing. We began the year with one unfilled position and two positions filled with temporary persons.  Budget constraints caused one of the three vacant tenure track faculty lines to be withdrawn.  However we successfully filled the other two vacancies with persons on tenure track.

Enrollment in courses at both the lower and upper division levels was stable.  There were modest increases at both levels.  Lower division course enrollment increased by 1.5% and upper division course enrollment increased by 2.9%.  This produced and overall increase of 2.0%.  These changes were determined by comparing enrollment numbers for the fall and spring semesters of 2002-2003 with those of 2001-2002.  Though the increases are not huge they represent increases at both levels of study and hopefully are indicators of future growth in accounting enrollments.  Although I have no firm numbers to prove an increase in students who choose a degree program in accounting the activity I have experienced in the last several months certainly points in that direction.  I cannot ever recall having as much interest shown by transfer students, current students changing their major field and new freshmen students seeking scholarship funds as they make plans to complete an accounting degree.  This certainly provides me with optimism for future growth in the accounting program at Austin Peay State University.

Another area where we had great success was in fund raising for accounting scholarships.  Through the efforts of Lawrence Baggett of the accounting faculty and several students who worked during the annual alumni/development phonathon over $20,000 of pledges, gifts and contributions for the accounting alumni scholarship endowment fund.  This amount was well in excess of the target amount set in the year's objectives for the department.

Success was also achieved by our student chapter of the Institute of Management (IMA).  With the very capable leadership of the faculty advisor David Eichelberger and the hard work of the student officers and members the chapter was successful in many areas.  They held regular meetings and invited successful alumni and noted area accounting professionals to speak to students.  They participated in several Nashville area community service events to help meet the needs of society.  They worked long and hard at numerous events at the Nashville Coliseum raising funds that were used by the student members to attend the national convention and student conference for IMA.  At the end of the year we were pleased to be notified that one of the APSU IMA student teams placed in the top ten for the nation in the case competition.

Though the accounting department enjoyed success during the past academic year we move into the new year in an apprehensive state of mind.  We are not yet aware of what the organization structure will be.  We are concerned because of not knowing what to expect.  We fear that the successes achieved by much hard work and vigorous effort may be lost in the "shuffle".