***Please provide a summary regarding if Arvel acted ethically and why. Also, please see attachment for more information.

This brief case involves an ethical issue that many future accounting graduates have faced in recent years. Internship programs are an important facet of the recruiting efforts of large accounting firms. Those accounting firms typically offer internships to students that they hope to hire on a permanent basis when they graduate. Accounting majors enrolled in five-year accounting programs may have an opportunity to take two internships before they graduate. In this case, Arvel Smart served an internship with a Big Four accounting firm during the summer between his third and fourth years in a five-year accounting program. By the end of his fourth year of college, Arvel had decided to accept the job offer that firm had given him at the conclusion of his internship. But, Arvel delayed accepting the job offer so that he could take a second internship with another firm during the summer between his fourth and fifth years in college. The key issue in this case is whether Arvel acted unethically by accepting the second internship when he ultimately intended to accept the offer for a permanent position that he had received as a result of his first internship.

186 Case 4.6 Arvel Smart, Accounting Major CASE 4.6 ARVEL SMART, ACCOUNTING MAJOR Synopsis This brief case involves an ethical issue that many future accounting graduates have faced in recent years. Internship programs are an important facet of the recruiting efforts of large accounting firms. Those accounting firms typically offer internships to students that they hope to hire on a permanent basis when they graduate. Accounting majors enrolled in five-year accounting programs may have an opportunity to take two internships before they graduate. In this case, Arvel Smart served an internship with a Big Four accounting firm during the summer between his third and fourth years in a five-year accounting program. By the end of his fourth year of college, Arvel had decided to accept the job offer that firm had given him at the conclusion of his internship. But, Arvel delayed accepting the job offer so that he could take a second internship with another firm during the summer between his fourth and fifth years in college. The key issue in this case is whether Arvel acted unethically by accepting the second internship when he ultimately intended to accept the offer for a permanent position that he had received as a result of his first internship. 187 Case 4.6 Arvel Smart, Accounting Major Arvel Smart, Accounting MajorKey Facts 1. Arvel Smart's parents were CPAs who had their own accounting firm in a small town in southeastern Missouri. 2. Like his parents, Arvel attended the University of Missouri at Columbia and majored in accounting. 3. During the summer between his third and fourth years in Missouri's five-year accounting program, Arvel served an auditing internship with a Big Four practice office in Kansas City. 4. At the conclusion of that internship, Arvel was offered a permanent position with the Big Four firm; the job offer would be open until the end of the following summer. 5. Because he wanted to spend the summers between his fourth and fifth years in college with his girlfriend who had accepted an internship with a Big Four practice office in St. Louis, Arvel interviewed for an internship that summer with two regional accounting firms based in St. Louis. 6. Before accepting an internship offer from one of the two St. Louis firms, Arvel decided that he would accept the Big Four job offer at the conclusion of the second internship. 7. Arvel experienced some degree of guilt when he accepted the internship with the St. Louis firm because he realized there was only a remote chance that he would consider accepting a fulltime position with that firm. 8. Arvel cleared his guilty conscience by rationalizing that it was the responsibility of the St. Louis firm to demonstrate that it offered more opportunities for him than the Big Four firm from which he had an outstanding job offer. Instructional Objectives Case 4.6 Arvel Smart, Accounting Major 188 1. To expose students to an ethical dilemma that many accounting majors face during their college careers. 2. To provide students with an opportunity to discuss their job search activities. Suggestions for Use For the past several years, the job market within the accounting profession has been a sellers' market. Many large accounting firms have desperately tried to hire new accounting graduates to \"staff up.\" The ethical dilemma raised by this case is one that many of my students have faced in recent years. Some students may find this case \"strikes too close to home\" and, as a result, may be reluctant to share their personal views on the central issue in the case. To overcome this problem, consider preparing a brief anonymous survey form that your students can use to respond to the two case questions. After you have collected the forms, collate the students' responses and post them on the board or overhead to initiate discussion of the case. When discussing this case, you might consider adding additional hypothetical facts or circumstances to those included in the case. For example, some of my students in the past have asked whether Arvel disclosed his first internship in the vita that he used while interviewing for the second internshipI don't know the answer to that question. You might also consider telling students to assume that Arvel was aware that one or more other students had not received offers for a second internship after it had become known that they had already accepted an offer for a permanent position. Quite often, I have students in my class who have not yet been involved in the recruiting process. This case provides an opportunity for students to discuss that process, to share \"war stories,\" and to provide helpful hints to each other. Suggested Solutions to Case Questions 1. No doubt, your students, like my students, will have differing opinions regarding this issue. Several of my students indicated that unless Arvel was specifically asked whether he had such an offer, he did not have a responsibility to provide this information to the two St. Louis accounting firms. A follow-up question you might pose to your students is whether recruiters for the two St. Louis accounting firms had the right to ask Arvelor any other interviewees, for that matter whether they had outstanding job offers as a result of previous internships they had served. 2. The majority of my students generally express the viewpoint that Arvel did not behave unethically by accepting the second internship when he ultimately intended to accept the job offer that was a result of his first internship. Several students typically adopt Arvel's mindset by maintaining that it was the St. Louis firm's responsibility to demonstrate to him that it offered more opportunities than the Big Four firm from which he had an outstanding job offer