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Northern Illinois University

College of Business - NIU

CPA Exam Overview

Certified Public Accountant Examination

The Uniform Certified Public Accountant's (CPA) exam is a professional credentialing and licensing exam. To apply to sit for the exam, CPA candidates must meet the requirements established by the Board of Accountancy in the state in which they plan to practice as a CPA. Most requirements include at least a bachelor degree, some require additional hours, and some also require work experience. To view the requirements to sit for the exam in the state of Illinois see the NIU CPA Review website at www.cpareview.niu.edu. For other states, see www.nasba.org. The general requirements for Illinois include:

  1. A bachelor degree.
  2. A total of 150 semester hours of college, with no repeat courses.
  3. 24 semester hours in accounting and auditing to include one audit, income tax, managerial accounting and financial accounting course.
  4. 24 semester hours of nonaccounting business hours such as business law, marketing, management, economics, and finance.

Candidates in Illinois can be approved to sit for the exam in the final semester of meeting the above requirements. This is called a "provisional" approval.

The exam is administered via computer at approved Prometric testing centers. Candidates may select testing times from the following months:
January, February, April, May, July, August, October, or November.

The exam covers four subject areas:

  1. Auditing referred to as the Audit exam.
  2. Financial, governmental, and not-for-profit accounting called the FAR exam.
  3. Individual, corporate and partnership taxation, business law, and professional ethics. This section is referred to as the Regulation (REG) section.
  4. Economics, finance, managerial accounting, technology, and business law for forming, running, and dissolving business entities. This section is referred to as the Business Environment and Concepts (BEC) exam.

The exam consists of multiple-choice questions and short cases called simulations. A simulation is a short case study question which includes items such as database research on a professional topic and written communication responses. For sample exams see www.cpa-exam.org.

Northern Illinois University (NIU) offers a live CPA Review course to help people prepare for the exam. For further information about the exam and our world class CPA Review courses, see www.cpareview.niu.edu. For specific questions, please contact the CPA review office via email cpareview@niu.edu or phone 1(815) 753-6207.