THE RELEVANCE OF ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION ON THE FORMATION OF ACCOUNTING STUDENTS: THE PERCEPTIONS OF COURSE COORDINATORS

Abstract

The goal of this research is to verify the perceptions of the relevance given by the course coordinators of accounting regarding the inclusion and how to approach the teaching of environmental subjects in the training process of the undergraduate courses in accounting in institutions of public higher education in Brazil. Were surveyed universities, university colleges and colleges in integrated local, state and federal levels. The selection of the universities was make on the website of the National Institute of Educational Studies Anísio Teixeira - INEP, which contains the ratio of public institutions with undergraduate degree in accounting. The universe analyzed was all course coordinators of accounting degree of public universities. The rate of responses was about 37%. The data collection was conducted through a survey, by telephone and mail. The analysis results point to two directions. The first is that the course coordinators of federal institutions are more aware of the importance of the environment if compared to the coordinators of municipal institutions. The second is that in regions where the relationship with nature is more present, like in North region, the opinion of the coordinators interviewed are unanimous about the importance of environmental issues in the training of graduate students.