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Subject area: Accounting

Why choose Accounting at the University of Edinburgh?

  • Our accounting-related programmes offer you the flexibility of pursuing a joint programme in:

    • accounting and business
    • accounting and finance
    • economics and accounting
    • law and accountancy

  • Our exchange programme offers you exciting opportunities to study abroad in Year 3 at one of our partner universities in:

    • Asia
    • Australia and New Zealand
    • Canada
    • the USA
    • Europe

  • Major accounting firms, as well as other large companies, regularly deliver talks to, and conduct recruitment activities with, our students, both on course and through wider programme-related activities.

Study abroad

With an international community like this one you never know who you will meet and from where in the world they come.

Bakani Dube 4th year, MA (Hons) Accounting & Finance
Bakani Dube 4th year, MA (Hons) Accounting & Finance

Introducing Accounting

Contemporary global business, whether for-profit or not-for-profit, is full of complexity, tensions and socio-political, economic and cultural challenges.

Our Accounting and Finance related degree programmes will prepare you intellectually and practically to embrace these complexities, negotiate tensions and address the wider challenges facing contemporary businesses, governments and not-for-profit organisations.

Alongside this, you will develop the necessary personal and professional competences required to work across a range of roles central to contemporary business, with particular focus on accounting and finance related professional roles.

Accountants play a crucial role in business. Their ability to measure financial information and use this to make projections affects economic and organisational decision-making at all levels within firms, organisations, and governments.

Accountancy is one of the fastest-growing areas of business activity. Financial accountants report on the performance of an organisation while management accountants provide financial information to help with planning and strategy.

Studying accounting at the University of Edinburgh offers you a flexible programme of study. You are able to combine your study of accounting with business, finance, economics or law and take a range of option courses. This offers you a broad-based programme with the flexibility to change direction and specialise through your course choices.

Our staff have a world-leading reputation as prominent researchers in the accounting discipline. Our teaching is therefore grounded in state-of-the-art contemporary research findings and literature. This helps to ensure that our graduates develop the necessary personal and professional competencies required to work across a range of roles in contemporary accounting practice, making them very attractive to prospective employers.

Our programmes will provide an excellent foundation for those hoping to gain a professional accountancy qualification and can also prepare you for careers in finance and other sectors.

Accreditation

Our MA accounting-related programmes are accredited by the:

  • Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland (ICAS)
  • Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW)
  • Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA)
  • Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA)
  • Association of International Accountants (AIA)
  • Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA)