Experiential Learning across Disciplines: Mixing International Business and Accounting

Abstract

"Most simulations and experiential learning exercises are anchored in a specific discipline though such disciplinary limitation does not fit well be-yond the academic environment. Therefore, students must be provided with multi-disciplinary experiences which transcend these artificial curricular boundaries. International business, by both content and operation, requires a truly multidisciplinary perspective. Using the international business course as an initial platform, a capstone planning exercise was developed to expose students to this multi-disciplinary perspective. But the inherent dichotomy between qualitative and quantitative presentation resulted in major difficulties for students, essentially disguising the multi-disciplinary perspective in a series of reporting problems. A read-ily available solution to unmask these difficulties existed in another discipline, but one with which most students would not generally be acquainted. This paper describes that solution and its effectiveness as seen from the student perspective. Us-ing self-reporting, students demonstrated that crossing disciplinary boundaries greatly improved their product quality, while significantly contributing to their general knowledge, and increasing both their inter group and inter-disciplinary communications skills. "