Week 4:
Teacher Created Materials

September 3, 2013

During my fourth week at Teacher Created Materials, all of my school studies in accounting came together with all of my experiences and training in the first three weeks. During this week, and most likely for the rest of my time here, I will now be working side by side with my mentor, the Senior Accountant, on projects dealing with the General Ledger and Reconciliation sheets. This is the aspect of accounting that most directly corresponds with the methods taught in Cornell courses, and the biggest challenge now facing me is combining theory with practice.

The first thing that I learned this week, which is definitely one of the most important aspects of the job, is how to post journal entries. These are the entries that are reflected in balance sheets, cash flow statements, and income statements. These entries must net to zero, involve both a debit and a credit, and reflect a transfer of funds from one account of the company to another. The first journal entry that I had to post dealt with transferring funds from cash to an account, which human resources could draw from in order to pay the semi-monthly paychecks to employees. I input these entries into TCM’s Sage accounting software, printed out the entry, attached it to the necessary documents, and filed it away for month-end close. If I were to make a mistake, such as placing the funds into an inappropriate account, I would have to post a reversing entry. This involves making the exact opposite entries that I made in the first place. After that, I would be able to make the appropriate entry that I made in the first place.

One very important thing I learned was the typical schedule for a senior accountant. Jared explained to me that the first week of each month typically involves in month-end close for the previous month. This involves reconciling all accounts, turning in all reports, and adjusting balance sheets and income statements. These are all of the reports that a company uses as a judge of how well business is going, and what they need to do in order to improve. The next week is typically utilized for projects that the particular accountant chooses to work on, and this is followed by a week of preparation for month-end close. Finally, it is time for month-end close. Therefore, this particular week greatly involved preparing for the month-end close with tasks such as submitting journal entries and reconciling all accounts. With month-end close being this week, I assume that I will be very busy with finishing journal entries and helping Jared reconcile any accounts that need to be in order for him to submit his final reports.

I was extremely fortunate to have my cousin come and visit me this week. He is in the Navy and is currently stationed in San Diego, so he made the one and a half hour drive to come visit me. It was great to catch up with him because I had not seen him since before I began studying at Cornell. We went to Venice Beach in Los Angeles and had a great time simply enjoying the sights and walking the boardwalk. On Saturday night, we went to the world famous Comedy Store in Hollywood. This was definitely my favorite experience of the trip, as I am an avid fan of stand-up comedy. We got to see a total of fourteen comics perform that night, including a few of my favorites. It was great to get into downtown Los Angeles, see my cousin, and finally have many concepts and studies tie together at TCM.