Visual sizzle

Fraud Edge: A forum for fraud-fighting faculty in higher ed

Where do students go for replays of late-night TV shows? Latest music hits? Viral news? They usually watch Internet videos. YouTube is one of their favorite websites. William Ferriter and Adam Garry, authors of the e-book “Teaching the iGeneration,” determined that nearly 80 percent of the U.S. Internet population watch videos online each month. So, if you were to give your students an assignment to create videos for learning more about fraud examination, we’re guessing they’d say, “Awesome!” 

Video making allows them to be creative and tell stories. Also, “student generated videos can be a basis for Project Based Learning, which encourages critical thinking, collaboration, and communication, and takes them to higher levels in Bloom’s Taxonomy,” according to the article, “Student Generated Videos” on the Center for Teaching, Learning and Technology site. The process helps them think critically, develop communication skills and collaborate with one another, particularly if they make videos together in groups.

However, we present this video approach with caution: Although our students are tech-savvy, not all of us educators are sophisticated enough to require student-made videos as assignments without encountering a few challenges. The University of Pennsylvania provides guidance to educators to minimize student and educator frustration. 

IMPLEMENTATION

Students may experience frustration during the assignment if you don’t carefully lead them through the planning process. They probably won’t realize how much time it will take to produce their videos. Therefore, write the assignment so that it promotes meticulous student planning, which will increase the possibility that they’ll be efficient and productive. Clearly state the purpose in the directions you give at the beginning of the course, such as: Students will produce videos of ethical scenarios, either real or imagined, depicting fraudulent activity, cover-up of that activity and investigation of the fraud. 

Resist the urge to provide them with appealing fraud scenarios; most prefer to develop their own creative solutions. However, restrict them to fraud schemes that will lend themselves well to videos, such as ghost employees, sales skimming, invoicing via shell companies and employee theft of inventory. Restricting types of schemes also will reduce production time. Make sure they realistically portray organizations with at least some internal controls. Also, emphasize that their videos should address how companies can change their controls to reduce the possibilities of frauds reoccurring. 

Ethical dilemmas also make a video more interesting. For instance, if collusion is part of the scheme, then including some footage of the ethical dilemma provides value to fellow students.

Require students to submit one-page general descriptions of their videos three weeks before filming. They don’t have to provide details because they’ll probably work most of them out while shooting. (Early disputes about details could alienate group members even before they get started.) 

For a non-fraud movie summary, see “Kermit’s Swamp Years.” As in this example, students should include a cast list of all actors and team members. (Students can invite their friends to also be cast members.)  

Encourage students to use resources such as Microsoft’s free editing software, MovieMaker, and Apple’s iMovie, which is also included in newer operating systems. Click here for an example of a class handout with instructions for MovieMaker. After you distribute the handout, you can demonstrate the software on your computer for the class. 

THE RED CARPET

You can add a bit of healthy competition (and increase the videos’ quality), by holding a film festival and an Academy Awards® presentation. Students can vote online at an education platform, such as Blackboard, for festival and Oscar winners — for best picture, best leading actor, best leading actress, best supporting actor, best supporting actress, best video editing, etc. Or you can ask principals from a local firm that offers fraud examination services to judge the submissions. Present trophies to winners in class or at an ACFE student chapter meeting. Some of our student winners have displayed their trophies in dorm rooms or on fireplaces or in bedrooms at childhood homes for their friends and families to see.
  
After students complete their videos and awards are presented, discuss video content. Begin with the elements of the Fraud Triangle. What was the perpetrator’s perceived pressure to commit fraud? What opportunities did the fraudster have? How did the fraudster rationalize his or her actions? Then turn to the ACFE’s Fraud Tree. What were the types of occupational frauds that students illustrated? Where do we place them on the Fraud Tree? Finally, how in the videos were the fraudster’s actions discovered? How can the organization implement controls to minimize the risk of these types of fraud?

Some of these do’s and don’ts may be helpful when you’re implementing a video assignment for the first time.

DO

• Provide students with an approximate length for the video — 13 to 15 minutes is recommended.
• Share time requirements with students. For a 13- to 15-minute video, they’ll need at least four hours for filming. They should plan at least two film sessions because after they edit, they’ll probably have to reshoot. Editing generally takes twice as long as filming.
• Caution students that actors will have to change wardrobes several times if the plots take place over many days.
• Students should try to have realistic backgrounds, costumes and props. If a fraudster has a gambling habit, then students should attempt to film at a casino instead of a dorm room or stark-white classroom. (Of course, they should seek permission to shoot on location.)
• Make sure students devote adequate time to linking their scenarios to the Fraud Triangle because many viewers might not be familiar with the illustration.
• Suggest that students make their video explanations of events clear and adequate instead of quick and brief to help with the flow of scenes.
• Allow students to use any video-creating software for which they have adequate support to decrease editing difficulties.
• Consider offering extra credit for this assignment instead of making it a requirement for the first time or two that you use it in your course. 

DON’T 

• Show a student video from a prior semester to students when you first give the assignment directions. This could undermine the integrity of the assignment and the students’ creativity. Also, students may be overly critical of the examples before they discover how hard it is to produce their videos.
• Allow more than one group to depict a particular fraud scheme so that students will learn from various scenarios. 
• Forget to focus on sound quality. Suggest that actors enunciate clearly and speak much louder than average conversational decibel levels.
• Allow students to read their speaking lines when acting in the film. Do memorize!

LEARNING THAT WILL REMAIN

According to educator Travis McNaughton in his 2012 blog posting, research has shown that student video productions have the potential to motivate student learning in meaningful ways and help develop critical viewing, communication, investigation, problem solving and analytical skills. (See “ The Power Of Video In Learning Communities,” from “The Learning Principal.”) 

This student-centered activity is enjoyable for the creators and the video viewers. We also believe it will capture students’ attention and engage them in ways that differ from any research paper.  

Shondra Johnson, CFE, is an instructor of accounting at Bradley University in Peoria, Ill. She’s a member of the ACFE Higher Education Advisory Committee.  

George R. Young, Ph.D., CFE, CPA, is an associate professor at Florida Atlantic University and the academic director of the forensic concentration in the Masters of Accounting program at the university. He’s chair of the ACFE Higher Education Advisory Committee and co-author of “Forensic Accounting and Fraud Examination,” a textbook published by McGraw-Hill. 

Read more insight and discuss this article in the ACFE's LinkedIn group. 

The Association of Certified Fraud Examiners assumes sole copyright of any article published on www.Fraud-Magazine.com or ACFE.com. Permission of the publisher is required before an article can be copied or reproduced.