Tutoring for 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting at MIT Sloan

The 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting course at the MIT Sloan School of Management introduces Executive MBA (EMBA) students to the processes, principles, standards, and strategic applications of financial reporting. This financial accounting course is a mandatory course in the MIT EMBA curriculum. 15.720 provides the accounting literacy required for executives and owners. The 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting emphasizes active classroom participation and real-world corporate case analysis.

This page discusses how our accounting tutors provide tutoring for the 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting course at the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Tutoring for MBA Programs Available at the MIT Sloan School of Management
Objectives of the Corporate Financial Accounting Course at MIT Sloan School of Management
Corporate Financial Accounting Course Content at MIT Sloan School of Management
Prerequisites for the Corporate Financial Accounting Course
Teaching Format for 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting Course at MIT Sloan
Corporate Financial Accounting Course Tutoring Plan
Case Studies Used in Corporate Financial Accounting at MIT Sloan School of Management
Required Textbook and Supplemental Resources for Corporate Financial Accounting
Key Questions Addressed in Corporate Financial Accounting at MIT Sloan
Teaching Faculty for the Corporate Financial Accounting Course
Grading in the Corporate Financial Accounting Course at MIT Sloan School of Management
Use of AI in 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting at MIT Sloan School of Management
Order of Topics in Corporate Financial Accounting Course at MIT Sloan School of Management
In Person Tutoring Locations Around MIT for Corporate Financial Accounting Tutoring
Other Financial Accounting Courses We Tutor
Tutoring for 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting at the MIT Sloan School of Management

Tutoring for MBA Programs Available at the MIT Sloan School of Management

Students in the Executive MBA (EMBA) program are encouraged to utilize internal course support resources first when navigating difficult accounting concepts. The Teaching Assistants (TAs) play a central role in helping students achieve the course objectives by holding regular recitation sessions and grading assignments. Students can contact the TAs directly for assistance, and if additional clarification or one-on-one help is needed, they are always welcome to email the professor. For students seeking extra structured review outside of live sessions, the course also integrates free access to myBusinessCourse (MBC), an online learning platform offering eLectures, Guided Example videos, and auto-graded practice problems with instant feedback.

Objectives of the Corporate Financial Accounting Course at MIT Sloan School of Management

The primary objective of 15.720 is to help students master the mechanics of corporate financial accounting so that MIT’s EMBAs, as senior leaders or owner-operators, can understand financial statements and make better decisions. This involves:

Understanding the Accounting Cycle: Learning how day-to-day business transactions are captured, recorded through double-entry bookkeeping (debits and credits), adjusted at the end of a period, and summarized into formal financial reports.
Mastering the Four Primary Financial Statements: Building the ability to construct, read, and interpret the Balance Sheet, the Income Statement, the Statement of Cash Flows, and the Statement of Shareholders’ Equity.
Understanding Accrual vs. Cash Basis Accounting: Understanding why revenues and expenses are recognized when earned or incurred rather than when cash changes hands, and how matching principles affect reported profits.
Applying Accounting Standards and Rules: Developing familiarity with foundational frameworks—such as GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles) or IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards)—and how specific rules govern key accounts like revenue recognition, inventory valuation (FIFO/LIFO), depreciation of long-term assets, and debt.
Performing Basic Financial Statement Analysis: Using financial ratios (liquidity, solvency, profitability, and efficiency) to evaluate a company’s financial health, compare performance across competitors, and make informed investment or lending decisions.
Recognizing Management Discretion: Understanding where accounting rules allow management estimates and judgment, how those choices can impact reported earnings, and why ethical standards and internal controls are critical to preventing financial fraud.

By blending textbook fundamentals with real corporate reporting cases, the course equips executives to interpret financial statements, evaluate accounting choices, and understand the ethical implications of financial reporting.

Corporate Financial Accounting Course Content at MIT Sloan School of Management

The syllabus covers the full spectrum of corporate financial reporting, moving from basic accounting mechanics to analyzing and interpreting the balance sheet, income statement, statement of equity, and cash flow statements. Core subject areas include:

Foundations & Revenue Recognition: Accrual accounting, revenue recognition, and allowance accounting.
Assets & Valuation: Inventory and Cost of Goods Sold (COGS), Property, Plant, and Equipment (PPE) and depreciation, intangible assets, and marketable securities.
Corporate Transactions & Liabilities: Acquisitions and intercorporate ownership, loan losses and fair value, long-term debt, leases, shareholders’ equity, and accounting for income taxes.
Financial Statement Analysis: Statement of cash flows, comparative financial statement analysis, and accounting ethics.

Prerequisites for the 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting Course

While the syllabus does not list formal prerequisite courses, students are expected to complete independent preparation before each class session. Specifically, students are encouraged to use the online myBusinessCourse (MBC) platform -watching eLectures, reviewing Guided Example videos, and completing auto-graded practice problems – on their own time prior to class.

Teaching Format for 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting Course at MIT

The 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting Course at MIT is taught through a mix of lectures, case studies, practice assignments, and online quizzes. The course material and assignments are managed on Canvas (canvas.mit.edu/courses/31870), The course usually has 18 scheduled class sessions over 9 weekends. Classroom sessions rely heavily on interactive case discussions governed by strict MIT Sloan norms.

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Corporate Financial Accounting Course Tutoring Plan

Graduate Tutor works with MIT’s EMBA students to work out a customized tutoring plan for each student. This differs between students, as each comes with their unique backgrounds and has different levels of knowledge.

Some of MIT’s executive MBA students who may be successful and senior executives at tech firms or doctors or actors come with no prior accounting knowledge. So we work out a program to start with the very basics and build a good foundation before the course start and continue working with them on a weekly basis.

Other MIT’s executive MBA students come with a tremendous amount of experience, including finance or accounting backgrounds, and only want to work on the corporate finance case studies to fine-tune their understanding.

Given that these students are executives and already have demanding schedules, graduate tutors, corporate finance tutors, schedule time in the evenings, weekends, or even early mornings. We meet each student where they need us.

Case Studies Used in Corporate Financial Accounting at MIT Sloan School of Management

Real-world corporate cases anchor nearly every module of the course, challenging students to apply accounting rules to actual business scenarios. The ten cases introduced in the 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting Course are:

Shrek 2 Mini-Case (Overview and introduction)
iPhone (Revenue recognition)
University of Phoenix (Revenue recognition and allowance accounting)
Hertz (PPE and depreciation)
Aquantive (Acquisitions and intercorporate ownership)
MSFT Reporting Strategy (Intangible assets)
Amazon.com (Statement of cash flows)
First National Bank (Loan losses and fair value)
Amazon vs. Walmart (Financial statement analysis)
FTX (Accounting ethics)

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Required Textbook and Supplemental Resources for Corporate Financial Accounting at MIT Sloan School of Management

Students rely on three primary resources throughout the term:

Textbook: Financial Accounting (7th edition) by Michelle Hanlon, Robert P. Magee, Glenn M. Pfeiffer, and Thomas R. Dyckman.
Course Pack: A dedicated compilation containing all business cases and supplemental readings for the semester.
myBusinessCourse (MBC): Included free with the textbook, providing eLectures, step-by-step Guided Example videos, and auto-graded practice exercises.

Key Questions Addressed in the 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting Course

Across the 9 weekends, the curriculum addresses essential accounting questions for executives, including:

How does accrual accounting differ from cash flows, and how do companies properly recognize revenue?
How are tangible assets (PPE), intangible assets, inventory, and marketable securities valued and depreciated on the balance sheet?
How do complex obligations—such as leases, long-term debt, income taxes, and loan losses—impact a firm’s financial health?
How can executives compare competing companies (such as Amazon vs. Walmart) using financial statement analysis, and what happens when corporate ethics fail (as in FTX)?

Teaching Faculty for the Corporate Financial Accounting Course

The Spring 2025 section of 15.720 was taught by Professor Nemit Shroff. Other faculty who have taught Financial Accounting at MIT Sloan include:

Michelle Hanlon (Howard W. Johnson Professor and Professor of Accounting—also the lead co-author of the required textbook for 15.720)
Rodrigo Verdi (Nanyang Technological University Professor of Accounting)
Joseph Weber (George Maverick Bunker Professor of Management and Professor of Accounting)
Eric So (Sloan Distinguished Professor of Global Economics and Management and Professor of Accounting)
S.P. Kothari (Gordon Y Billard Professor of Accounting and Finance)
Sugata Roychowdhury (Former MIT Sloan Professor of Accounting)

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Grading in the Corporate Financial Accounting Course at MIT Sloan School of Management

Final course grades are determined using three weighted components:

The largest is the Final Exam (60%): A single open-book, open-notes take-home exam designed to take approximately 2–3 hours. Students have a 5-day window (May 1 at 8:00 AM to May 5 at 8:00 AM) to start the exam, and once started, they have 12 hours to complete it.

EMBAs also have group homework accounting for 20%: Five homework sets completed within assigned study groups and submitted on time via Canvas to measure ongoing comprehension. Class Participation and Discussion account for the remaining 20% of the grade.

Use of AI in 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting at MIT Sloan School of Management

Unlike many traditional finance classes, the 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting course syllabus explicitly says that “There is no restriction on the use of Gen AI tools such as Chat GPT in this class”. However, students remain strictly bound by MIT’s academic integrity and plagiarism policies, which require properly citing any borrowed words, ideas, or internet research.

Order of Topics in Corporate Financial Accounting Course at MIT Sloan School of Management

Students meet over 9 days and cover topics starting from the fundamentals of financial accounting such as the accrual accounting concept all the way to comprehensive financial statement analysis and ethics in financial reporting:

Overview/Introduction (Shrek 2 Mini-Case) and Accrual Accounting
Revenue Recognition (iPhone Case) and Allowance Accounting (University of Phoenix Case)
Inventory/COGS and PPE & Depreciation (Hertz Case)
Acquisitions & Intercorporate Ownership (Aquantive Case) and Intangible Assets (MSFT Reporting Strategy Case)
Marketable Securities and Statement of Cash Flows (Amazon.com Case)
Loan Losses & Fair Value (First National Bank Case) and Long-Term Debt
Leases and Equity
Accounting for Income Taxes and Financial Statement Analysis (Amazon vs. Walmart Case)
Ethics (FTX Case) and Review & Synthesis

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Tutoring Locations Around MIT for Corporate Financial Accounting Tutoring

Most of GraduateTutor.com’s tutoring for EMBAs is done live and online on Zoom because the EMBAs come to campus only on specified weekends. However, we can meet for one-on-one private tutoring at any of the locations below too if students prefer in-person tutoring.

MIT Hayden Library in Building 14S-100 (160 Memorial Drive, Cambridge, MA 02139)
MIT E53 Study Space at Dewey Library Study Area (30 Wadsworth Street, Cambridge, MA 02142)
MIT Barker Engineering Library in Building 10-500 (77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139)
Cambridge Public Library – Central Square Branch (45 Pearl Street, Cambridge, MA 02139)
Cambridge Public Library – Main Branch (449 Broadway, Cambridge, MA 02138)
Ripple Café (314 Main Street, Cambridge, MA 02142)
Tatte Bakery & Café – Main Street (101 Main Street, Cambridge, MA 02142)
Tatte Bakery & Café – Third Street (318 Third Street, Cambridge, MA 02142)
Jaho Coffee Roaster & Wine Bar (425 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139)
1369 Coffee House (757 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139)
Life Alive Organic Café (431 Main Street, Cambridge, MA 02142)

Tutoring for 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting at the MIT Sloan School of Management

Because the 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting course builds rapidly from basic accrual principles to complex corporate transactions—and culminates in a 60% take-home final exam—consistent weekly practice is essential. Doing the pre-class digital walkthroughs on myBusinessCourse, attending the study group homework sets and recitations is very important.

Graduatetutor’s financial accounting tutors will be happy to provide private tutoring 1-o-1 in person or online for the 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting course at MIT Sloan or for other financial accounting courses at the Full-Time Two-Year MBA, MIT Sloan Evening MBA, Leaders for Global Operations (LGO), MIT Sloan Fellows MBA (SFMBA) and MIT Executive MBA (EMBA). Email us or call us to start as soon as possible.

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Prerequisites for the 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting Course

Key Questions Addressed in the 15.720 Corporate Financial Accounting Course

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