NORTH CENTRAL TEXAS COLLEGE
COURSE SYLLABUS
COURSE AND INSTRUCTOR INFORMATION
Course title: Principles of Managerial Accounting
Course prefix, number, and section number: ACCT 2302.0400
Semester/Year of course: Fall, 2025
Semester start and end dates: Aug. 25-Dec. 13, 2025
Class meeting location, days, and times: MW, 11 am-12:20 pm. COR 364.
Semester credit hours: 3
Course description: This course is an introduction to the fundamental concepts of managerial accounting appropriate for all organizations. Students will study information from the entity's accounting system relevant to decisions made by internal managers, as distinguished from information relevant to users who are external to the company. The emphasis is on the identification and assignment of product costs, operational budgeting and planning, cost control, and management decision making. Topics include product costing methodologies, cost behavior, operational and capital budgeting, and performance evaluation.
Managerial accounting increasingly relies on data analytics and machine learning, so your ability to work with spreadsheet programs, especially Excel, is required.
Course prerequisites: ACCT 2301-Principles of Financial Accounting.
Required course materials: The text is Managerial Accounting. Braun & Tietz, 7th edition. The e-text and MyLab are available through the Access Pearson link in Course Navigation.
You may purchase the text and access to MyLab from either the NCTC bookstore or from Pearson. I encourage you to check prices with both since there may sometimes be significant differences. In any case, be sure your purchase includes access to the text and to MyLab.
Name of instructor: Richard W. Walker
Office location: Corinth campus, 313
Telephone number: 214-507-4610
E-mail address: rwalker@nctc.edu
Office hours for students: 8-9 a.m. & 1-3 pm, M-R. I am available all other times by text/phone and by appointment. Feel free to text/call or send a message via Canvas mail.
SYLLABUS CHANGE DISCLAIMER
The faculty member reserves the right to make changes to this published syllabus if it is in the best interest of the educational development of this class. Any such changes will be announced as soon as possible in person and/or writing.
SUMMARY OF COURSE ASSIGNMENTS
List of graded assignments: Students must successfully complete 12 Homework assignments, 12 Chapter Quizzes, and two exams—a mid-term and a final. All are accessible through Access Pearson in Course Navigation.
Students also will be required to complete a semester project on the topic of the time value of money. In addition, students are required to complete several Learning Outcome Assessments (LOs), some of which are provided through Access Pearson, others in Canvas.
Please refer to the Course Assignment Calendar for a schedule of assignments.
Graded assignments are weighted as follows:
Unit Exams 40%
Chapter Homework 15%
Chapter Quizzes 20%
Excel/Simulation 15%
Learning Outcome Assessments (LOs)* 5%
Research Report 5%
100%
LATE SUBMISSION POLICY: Students may not submit late work without prior approval from the instructor. There is no such thing in an accounting practice for late submission of assignments. And so it is for this class. There are two exceptions.
- A documented excuse. If, but only if, a student has both a legitimate reason for missing the assignment and s/he submits documentation for it, the instructor will allow a make-up within three calendar days of the due date.
Legitimate reasons for missing an assignment:
-
-
- Birth in the family
- Death in the family
- Illness documented by an attending physician (MD or DO)
- A hospital report or bill
- Irregular Military deployment—i.e., deployment that was not scheduled.
- No excuse. The instructor realizes that life sometimes just happens. So, once—and only once—during the semester if a student misses a due date due his/her own error, s/he may make up the assignment within three calendar days, but with a 10-point penalty for late submission.
In both cases, student must inform the instructor within one day—not one business day, one day—that the assignment has been missed. Then, once the instructor has extended assignment, the student must complete and submit it as soon as possible. Only under extreme circumstances may an assignment three calendar days after the due date.
Finally, no assignments due during the last week of the semester may be made up. There simply is no time to do so at that time.
SEE CANVAS FOR THE COMPLETE COURSE CALENDAR, OUTLINE, DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF GRADED WORK, AND OTHER RELATED MATERIAL.
*EXTRA CREDIT: I do not offer individual extra credit. It is not fair to other students who completed their work on time and sometimes at great sacrifice. Besides, ample opportunities for extra credit already are provided—attendance and LO scores (see Attendance below).
However, if a student scores greater than 70% on each LO assignment, I will add 10 points to their lowest exam grade at the end of the semester. If the student scores greater than 80% on each LO assignment (not on average, but on each LO), an additional 10 points will be added to her/his lowest exam score at the end of the semester. That’s total of 20 points—two letter grades.
I will take attendance as the semester progresses. However, it is up to the student to notify the instructor that the extra credit for LO scores has been earned.
ATTENDANCE: Attendance in this course is measured through completion of assignments. And it’s important. Every peer-reviewed study I’ve read concludes that by far the best indicator of student success is attendance. And nothing else, not even intelligence, even comes close. Therefore, attendance is worth 10% of your final grade. That’s a full letter grade. So, if you want individual extra credit, complete assignments on time and complete the LOs.
Final grade scale: The standard round-up grading scale will be used in this class; e.g., a score >= 79.5 will round up to a B letter grade, but a score of 79.49 will not. The same is true for other grade categories. This is NCTC policy.
A = 90-100
B = 80-89
C = 70-79
D = 60-69
F = 0-59
As mentioned before I do not offer individual extra credit, and I cannot change NCTC’s grading policy.
COLLEGE POLICIES
ADA STATEMENT—NCTC will adhere to all applicable federal, state and local laws, regulations and guidelines with respect to providing reasonable accommodations to afford equal educational opportunity. It is the student’s responsibility to contact the Office for Students with Disabilities to arrange appropriate accommodations. See the OSD Syllabus Addendum.
STUDENT SERVICES—NCTC provides a multitude of services and resources to support students. See the Student Services Syllabus Addendum for a listing of those departments and links to their sites.
COURSE POLICIES
AI Statements—Institutional & Course requirements: Absent a clear statement from a course instructor, use of or consultation with generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) or other similar technologies shall be treated analogously to assistance from another person, agency, or entity. In particular, using generative AI tools to substantially complete an assignment or exam is not permitted. Students should acknowledge the use of generative AI (other than incidental use) and default to disclosing such assistance when in doubt.
When students use generative AI to replace the rigorous demands of and personal engagement with their coursework, it runs counter to the educational mission of the college and undermines the heart of education itself. Artificial Intelligence, large language models, and technologies hold promise for deploying knowledge in service to others and accelerating the discovery of new knowledge. However, such technology poses new challenges to pedagogy and to integrity. Within the context of the teaching mission of the college, and consistent with the Student Code of Conduct, the authority to define the appropriate use, study, and deployment of these technologies rests with the faculty.
Individual course instructors, in coordination with their divisions, set policies regulating the use of generative AI tools in their courses, including allowing or disallowing some or all uses of such tools. Course instructors will set such policies in their course syllabi and clearly communicate such policies to students. Students who are unsure of policies regarding generative AI tools are encouraged to ask their instructors for clarification.
This course assumes that all work submitted by students will be generated by the students themselves, working individually or in groups. Students should not have another person/entity do the writing of any substantive portion of an assignment for them, which includes hiring a person or a company to write assignments and using artificial intelligence tools.
Academic Integrity Policy: I have zero tolerance for academic dishonesty. ZERO! For NCTC requirements, please refer to your student handbook.
Withdrawal Policy A student may withdraw from a course on or after the official date of record. It is the student’s responsibility to initiate and complete a Withdrawal Request Form.
Last day to withdraw from the course with a “W” is: Nov. 3, 2025.
Student Learning Outcomes: After successfully completing this course the student will be able to:
- Identify the role and scope of financial and managerial accounting and the use of accounting information in the decision-making process of managers.
- Define operational and capital budgeting, and explain its role in planning, control, and decision-making.
- Prepare an operating budget, identify its major components, and explain the interrelationships among its various components.
- Explain methods of performance evaluation.
- Use appropriate financial information to make operational decisions.
- Demonstrate use of accounting data in the areas of product costing, cost behavior, cost control, and operational and capital budgeting for management decisions.
QUESTIONS, CONCERNS, or COMPLAINTS
The student should contact the instructor to deal with any questions, concerns, or complaints specific to the class. If the student and faculty are not able to resolve the issue, the student may contact the chair or coordinator of the division. If the student remans unsatisfied, the student may proceed to contact the instructional dean.
Name of Chair/Coordinator: Teresa Laman
Office location: Corinth campus, #172 (inside Suite 170)
Telephone number: 940-498-6263
E-mail address: tlaman@nctc.edu
Name of Instructional Dean: Debbie Huffman
Office location: Gainesville campus—Bldg. 2100, Office #2106
Telephone number: 940-668-3357
E-mail address: dhuffman@nctc.edu