Each research team will be assisted by mentors, who are leading academics in their fields, representing the IAAER and the ACCA in progressing the sponsored research.

Two of these grants, totalling in excess of R120 000, have been awarded to three researchers in the Department of Accounting, namely Cecile Janse van Rensburg, Astrid Schmulian and Stephen Coetzee. The title of the first research project that will be conducted by the three staff members is “Student’s Reading Comprehension of the IASBConceptual Framework”. In terms of framework-based teaching (Barth 2008; Wells 2011; Hodgdon et al. 2011; Coetzee and Schmulian 2011), the conceptual framework should be at the foundation of teaching and studying international financial reporting standards. As such, the objective of this study is to test students’ reading comprehension of the conceptual framework. This paper will provide a framework for financial reporting academics to determine their own unique cohort of students’ reading comprehension of the conceptual framework. Prof Mary Barth of the Stanford University in the USA and Prof Ann Tarca of the University of Western Australia will be the mentors for the above research study.

The second project, to be undertaken by Stephen Coetzee, is entitled “Biodata as a Selection Tool within Professional Accounting Education in South Africa”. This study aims to develop a model based on academic performance and alternative data to predict whether or not students entering professional accounting degree and honours degree education programmes will successfully complete these programmes. The mentors for this study will be Prof Elizabeth Gammie of the Aberdeen Business School in Scotland and Prof Paul de Lange of RMIT University in Australia.

Stephen Coetzee	Cecile Janse van Rensburg	Astrid Schmulian