Accounting for Dummies

Every student admitted to the two-year program at UF is expected to bone up on his or her accounting skills prior to setting foot on campus. We’re given two options, either take an introductory accounting course at a local community college or buy the Essentials of Accounting workbook. UF strongly encourages us to take the community college class but that wasn’t a realistic option for me so I went with the workbook.

That might have been a mistake.

This book was preposterously easy to complete and its possible, err probable, that I didn’t learn anything. The questions in the book are almost entirely fill-in-the-blank questions and each blank is typically pre-filled with the first letter of the answer. Also, each question is preceded by a statement that includes the answer. Sounds easy, right? That’s because it is easy. My two-week old nephew could pass a pop quiz on the material covered in this book. Take a look at this question pulled from the chapter involving debits and credits.

In the language of accounting, the left side of an account is called the debit side, and the right side is called the credit side. Thus, instead of saying that increases in cash are recorded on the left side of the Cash account and decreases are recorded on the right side, accountants say that increases are recorded on the ________ side and decreases are recorded on the ________ side.

I blew through this Mad Libs version of accounting in a matter of days, missing only three questions along the way. I know I must have learned some accounting, it would be impossible not to have since the material is repeated ad nausem. However, I can’t shake the feeling that I only acquired a superficial knowledge of accounting and that come day two I’ll be lost.

I hope I didn’t screw up my MBA by not going to community college. Accounting can’t be this easy.