[letspassshallwe]

So I heard back from VBOA today and the licensing examiner/coordinator who reviewed my transcript deemed that I don’t have enough “upper-level” accounting credits to sit for the CPA exam. Excluding Financial and Managerial accounting, I have a total of 21 and the required amount is 24. I’m honestly a little perplexed that I graduated with an accounting degree that doesn’t align with VBOA’s requirements to sit for the CPA exam.

My question is, can this be challenged/appealed? Was anybody able to submit a justification to include certain business electives under accounting? I’ve been studying for FAR the past six weeks and was planning on taking the exam sometime late April or early May and I’d hate for this to be delayed.

FAR - MAY 2013
REG - AUG 2013
AUD - OCT 2013
BEC - NOV 2013

[ParanoidAndroid]

I agree with mla1169…The CPA Exam books tend to cover every single topic there is in accounting….I took Adv. Acg. in college but never covered derivatives and forward contracts/hedging, which were a nightmare to me… :'( LOL…

CPA for life...

[Lisa]

@letspass:

You might want to look at the TAX II class (called Principles of Federal Taxation II) taught by Amanda Petersen at the Alexandria campus of NOVA CC. This class covers several topics for the REG exam. She is excellent and the class is taught in 1 month!, and offered in June. I know that you're in a hurry to get the credits so you can sit for CPA exam, but the on-line class for Govt NFP does not have a very good reputation. The best instructors at NOVA are Jim Lock for Govt NFP and Auditing, Jim Gray Cost accounting, Ray Cook Advanced acounting, Jim Gale forTax I, and Amanda Petersen for Tax II. Actually, the noted instructors are great for anything they teach, the above noted classes are what they generally teach that is relevant for the advanced acconting classes. Unfortunately, most of these are not taught in the summer….Obviously, go forward with what you feel is best for you, and if your main goal is to get the credits you need then you will get that with the on-line class. But if you want a boost in knowledge for your CPA journey with good instructors then (unfortunately) not so much. Sorry for this post, but I felt responsible for making the NOVA suggestion and then after making the recommendation, reading your post about the 8 week Govt NFP class.

AUD 8/04/11: 78
BEC 1/9/12: 73, 4/04/12: 80
FAR 10/25/12: 80
REG 02/25/13: 79
Ethics 100%
VA License Issued 3/2013

[Partially Deaf]

@letspassshallwe sorry for the late reply, but yes

MBA Candidate - UCLA Anderson School of Management

REG 89 - 4/9/2012
BEC 88 - 5/29/2012
AUD 93 - 8/20/2012
FAR 83 - 2/4/2013
-All passed on the first attempt!

CFA Level 1 - Passed on first attempt in June 2014

[NotYetLicensedInVA]

I was too taken by suprise by VA Board “upper-level” credits. I have Masters Degree, but the Board did not count any accounting courses, which have the words “introductory”, “concepts”, even though the courses are graduate level. I passed CPA exams in another state but apparently I now have to take more “upper-level” credits to get licensed in VA. I did try to “appeal” but was told that is the requirements to fulfill.

Do you know whether non-degree accounting credits at George Mason of UVA School of Continuing and Professional Studies will satisfy the Board's requirements?

[alexio senchez]

For those of you in NOVA having this issue, consider sitting for the exam in DC. That's that path I'm taking since VA didn't recognize several of my accounting credits. DC, on the other hand, isn't picky as long as they are accounting courses.

[Anonymous]

Hey Alexio,

I am in NOVA and missing that one extra accounting class as well. And I was wondering if DC would count my intro classes as well. I double majored and I have over 150 credits and I technically have 21 credits of eligible accounting courses in VA, but apparently I am missing 3 credits. Including the the intro's I would obviously have over 24….and this doesn't even include the several other business courses that I have taken to get to a 150.

[Anonymous]

I used Louisiana State University for my extra accounting course, as well as for some of the ones in my degree. 8 week courses, all online, enroll anytime – https://is.lsu.edu/courselist.asp?cat=Accounting&nid=102&pg= If anyone decides to use them, feel free to message me for more info. They're pretty cheap and I've been pleased with them.

[Anonymous]

Hey Elisabeth,

I was planning on taking the Gov/non-profit class at LSU. Can u let me know if you took that class? Difficulty, quality of material…any info you can give helps. thanks.

[Anonymous]

That's I think the only one I haven't taken, sorry! In general, their textbooks are pretty understandable, and the professors are not very informative. So, if you figure you can learn from reading the textbook, then go for it! Personally, the taste of Govt and NP that I had in Advanced Accounting was more than enough for me…not looking forward to that part of the CPA exam, cause I skipped that class just to avoid the material! 😛

[Anonymous]

Hi C2p2a,

I'm taking Gnvt and not for profit through LSU right now. You are self teaching like a lot of on-line classes. I was told from other classmates at the Uni of South AL that the class is hard no matter where you take it because the accounting is so different from Financial. With that being said, I'm on chapter 5 and will be taking a test soon. The homework takes a lot of time! And it counts a lot for your grade. I have found the professor responds back to me almost immediately and explained a few things I didn't understand. I'm also taking my 2nd Auditing class through LSU- Fraud, because AL requires 2 auditing classes. Hope to be done by July 20 and start studying for BEC to take in late AUG.

LMK if you have more LSU q's about GVNT.

[Anonymous]

Hey bama_mom,

Thank you for the info. Can you let me know how long a chapter actually takes to complete? Can you do a chapter a day or two days? I was thinking of also adding the audit class (but audit would be very easy for me since I am very familiar with the subject).

Thanks,

[Anonymous]

I took Auditing online at UNEX Berkeley. I was able to do the class and study for the auditing portion of the CPA at the same time. This allowed me to get the credits needed to sit for the exam and prepare to pass the exam (both class final and CPA)

[Anonymous]

c2p2a, the course has 14 chapters/weeks/sections, and you're not allowed to take the final exam till after you've been enrolled for 8 weeks…so if you did one every 2 days, you'd be done with the “real” work in 4 weeks, but still have 4 weeks till they let you take the final exam and finish the course. 😐 But, that being said, the other courses I took you could definitely do a chapter in a day or two of focused study time…not a day or two of evenings after work, but a real day or two. But…I'll let bama_mom give you more info about that specific to the course. The course scheduling is standard to all their online courses, and they're real sticklers about it! Unless something has changed in the past few months since I took my last class with them…

(Note: Some of their classes are still “web-enabled” instead of “online” – those have a 3 lessons per 7 days limit, but don't have the 8 week limit.)

[KatieM]

The same thing happened to me with VBOA and I had to take a cost accounting class and I have 169 college credits… NOW… but regardless, they said I needed that class, so I took it, re-applied and was found eligible at that point.

Good Luck~

BEC (2/2013-59) - 5/22/2013-2nd attempt
AUD-
REG-
FAR-

[whatamidoing]

Nevermind…answered my own question!

F - 85 (11/2012)
R - 87 (1/2013)
A - 92 (2/2013)
B - 90 (4/2013)

DONE!

[Author]

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