If you are a commerce graduate and wish to study abroad, here’s an opportunity you can explore. Australia is rolling out the red carpet for wannabe accountants and New Zealand is expected to follow suit soon .
For a long time, IT, Engineering and MBA had been the favourite options of students going Down Under. Now accountancy has topped the list all because the Australian government has included it in the Migration Occupation in Demand List (MODL). That means if you are an accountant you have greater chances of getting a Permanent Residency visa.
In order to get the required points, an accountant will have to have his qualifications assessed by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Australia or the Institute of Certified Professional Accountancy. And even if you are not an accountant you can always enroll for a “conversion” course in any Australian institute. After all there are as many as 16 institutes that offer these programmes. Leading universities that have this course module are Bond, Deakin, Griffith, Southern Cross, Australian National University, Victoria, University of Notre Dame etc.
To enroll for the two-year Master of Professional Accounting (MPA) “conversion” course, what you need is a graduation degree (BA, B.Sc. or B.Com.) and an IELTS score of around 6.5. But remember the course will not make you a Chartered Accountant. Even a qualified Indian CA needs to clear a few papers to practise in Australia.
{{/usCountry}}To enroll for the two-year Master of Professional Accounting (MPA) “conversion” course, what you need is a graduation degree (BA, B.Sc. or B.Com.) and an IELTS score of around 6.5. But remember the course will not make you a Chartered Accountant. Even a qualified Indian CA needs to clear a few papers to practise in Australia.
{{/usCountry}}The MPA is an intense programme that has a 12-course structure. It is open to students from all streams. Some programmes include accounting for corporations, accounting for business decisions, commercial law, taxation and financial decision making. The fees vary from university to university. For example, the cost of such a course is A$ 13,000 in Australian Catholic University and A$ 35,000 per annum at the University of Technology, Sydney. In Indian currency that would come to around Rs 7-12 lakh besides another Rs 3 lakh per annum for living expenses. But if you are having second thoughts about whether you should invest that amount in an Australian degree, consider this. The starting salary for an accountant is A $40,000-60,000. Within a year, it usually touches A$70,000 per annum while CAs earn much more.
The degree will help you earn an extra five points towards a PR — for which the qualifying marks are 120. When you add this to the 5 points that you have already bagged for studying in Australia and another 60 for accounting being on the MODL list, then a PR could be yours for the taking. As Abhishek Sur, who plans to settle down in Australia, says, “I am enrolling for an MPA at the Deakin University since I would like to live in Australia. Subsequently, I will qualify as a CA.”