ERP course projects for accounting students

What makes a good ERP course project

An ERP course project is an assignment in which students run part of a fictional company inside a real ERP system and hand in both the system output and a written explanation of it. A good one has a prepared data pack, a single checkable answer for the core figures, and a rubric that rewards reasoning as much as correct entries.

This guide gives instructors six projects that build on one another, from setting up a company to auditing one. Each has learning outcomes, the steps students take, worked numbers where the answer can be checked, and assessment criteria. The body is vendor-neutral: the projects run on any ERP with a double-entry ledger, period close and bank reconciliation. The main cases use Canadian dollars and Ontario's 13% HST, which as of September 2026 is the harmonised rate the Canada Revenue Agency lists for Ontario; swap in your own jurisdiction's rate if you prefer.

Run the projects in order and let students keep the same company throughout, so an error made in project 2 is still there in project 4. That continuity is what makes ERP work different from worksheet exercises.

Designing an assessable project

ERP assignments go wrong in predictable ways: instructions that depend on screens the students cannot see, answers that differ because students chose different settings, and marking that takes hours because every submission is a screenshot. Four design choices prevent most of this.

Give every student or team its own workspace, and require submissions as exported reports plus a short written memo. The exports can be checked against the key in minutes; the memo is where the grade is really earned.

• Fix the configuration that changes the answer: costing method, tax rate, fiscal periods and account codes should be specified in the brief, not left to the student.
• Publish a data pack: a one-page company profile, a list of transactions with dates and amounts, and the source documents as simple PDFs or tables.
• Build in one checkable total per project, such as the trial balance total, the closing bank balance or the profit for the month, so marking starts with a single comparison.
• Ask for reasoning: every project ends with a written explanation of one or two figures, which separates understanding from button-pressing.

Project 1: set up a company and its chart of accounts

Students create a small trading company, Maple Supplies Ltd, which buys and resells office equipment in Ontario. They design a chart of accounts of 30 to 40 accounts, set up a fiscal year with twelve monthly periods, one tax rate for 13% HST, three customers, three suppliers and five products with cost and selling prices, and record opening capital of CAD 50,000: Dr Bank 50,000 / Cr Share capital 50,000.

The design element matters more than the data entry. Ask students to justify their numbering (for example, 1000s for assets, 2000s for liabilities, 3000s equity, 4000s revenue, 5000s expenses), to separate HST recoverable from HST payable, and to say which accounts should be closed to manual posting because only documents should touch them, such as trade receivables, trade payables and inventory.

• Learning outcomes: explain the five account types and their normal balances; design a coded chart of accounts; distinguish configuration from master data.
• Deliverables: exported chart of accounts, trial balance after the capital journal, and a one-page design rationale.
• Assessment criteria: every account has the correct type and normal balance; control accounts are identified and protected; the numbering leaves room for growth; the rationale explains at least three design decisions.

Project 2: run a month of trading

Students process one month of documents for Maple Supplies with no manual journals allowed: every figure must come from a purchase, sale, payment or receipt. After each document they record the journal the system created. The costing method is FIFO and all goods are bought at CAD 60 a unit.

The checkable totals are revenue of 13,200, cost of sales of 7,200 and rent of 2,000, giving a profit of 4,000, and a trial balance that foots at 64,916 on both sides: Bank 44,180, Trade receivables 4,916, Inventory 4,800 (80 units at 60), HST recoverable 1,820, Cost of sales 7,200 and Rent 2,000 on the debit side; HST payable 1,716, Share capital 50,000 and Revenue 13,200 on the credit side. Trade payables are nil.

The HST position is a deliberate teaching point. HST collected is 1,716 and input tax credits are 1,820 (1,560 on stock plus 260 on rent), so the business is owed a refund of 104 for the month. Ask students to explain why a profitable business can be in a refund position: it bought more taxable inputs than it sold in the month.

• Purchase invoice: 200 units at 60 = 12,000 plus HST 1,560. Dr Inventory 12,000 / Dr HST recoverable 1,560 / Cr Trade payables 13,560.
• Sales invoices: 120 units at 110 = 13,200 plus HST 1,716. Dr Trade receivables 14,916 / Cr Revenue 13,200 / Cr HST payable 1,716.
• Cost of the goods sold under FIFO: 120 units at 60. Dr Cost of sales 7,200 / Cr Inventory 7,200.
• Rent paid by cheque: 2,000 plus HST 260. Dr Rent 2,000 / Dr HST recoverable 260 / Cr Bank 2,260.
• Customer receipts of 7,000 and 3,000: Dr Bank 10,000 / Cr Trade receivables 10,000.
• Supplier paid in full: Dr Trade payables 13,560 / Cr Bank 13,560.
• Learning outcomes: trace each document to its journal; explain input tax credits; read the trial balance and the ageing report.
• Assessment criteria: trial balance agrees to the key; each document's journal is correctly written out; the HST refund is explained in the student's own words.

Project 3: reconcile the bank

The instructor issues a bank statement for the month. The cash book in the ERP shows 44,180. The statement shows a closing balance of 43,395. Students import or key the statement, match items, and find three differences: bank charges of 45 on the statement but not in the books; the customer receipt of 3,000 banked on the last day, which the bank credited the next month (a deposit in transit); and the rent cheque of 2,260, which the landlord had not yet presented (an unpresented cheque).

Only the bank charges belong in the books: Dr Bank charges 45 / Cr Bank 45, giving an adjusted cash book of 44,135. The other two items are timing differences that clear themselves. The reconciliation proves: statement balance 43,395, add deposit in transit 3,000, less unpresented cheque 2,260, equals 44,135, the adjusted cash book. Our guide on bank reconciliation step by step covers the technique in more depth.

• Learning outcomes: distinguish items that need a journal from timing differences; prepare a reconciliation statement; use the system's matching tools.
• Deliverables: the reconciliation report from the system, the adjusting entry, and a short note on how each outstanding item will clear.
• Assessment criteria: adjusted cash book of 44,135; the bank charges posted and nothing else; outstanding items correctly classified; the reconciliation foots with zero unexplained difference.

Project 4: close the month and produce statements

Students close the month. They post one accrual for an electricity bill of 300 that relates to the month but has not arrived: Dr Utilities 300 / Cr Accruals 300. The case records the HST on the bill when the invoice arrives, not at accrual. They then run the trial balance, close the period in the system and try to post a sales invoice dated in the closed month to see what happens.

The key numbers: profit for the month is 4,000 less bank charges 45 less utilities 300, which is 3,655. Total assets are Bank 44,135, Trade receivables 4,916, Inventory 4,800 and net HST recoverable 104, which is 53,955. Liabilities are Accruals 300, and equity is Share capital 50,000 plus profit 3,655, which is 53,655. Liabilities and equity together are 53,955, so the balance sheet balances.

Ask for a close memo of no more than one page: why profit of 3,655 does not equal the change in cash (cash fell from 50,000 to 44,135 because 4,800 is tied up in inventory, 4,916 in receivables and 104 in HST, while the 300 accrual is an expense not yet paid), and what the system did when a late invoice was posted into the closed period.

• Learning outcomes: post period-end adjustments; lock a period; prepare an income statement and balance sheet from the ledger; reconcile profit to cash.
• Assessment criteria: statements agree to the key; the period is closed in the system; the memo explains the profit-to-cash difference and the closed-period behaviour correctly.

Project 5: an audit exercise with planted errors

For auditing courses, the instructor prepares a separate company with a month of transactions and plants errors and irregularities. Students receive auditor-level access, the trial balance and a brief: find, evidence and quantify every misstatement, and say which control should have stopped it. Frame the work with ISA 240, which requires journal-entry testing to address management override (ISA 240 (Revised) is effective for audits of periods beginning on or after 15 December 2026), ISA 500 on audit evidence and ISA 530 on audit sampling.

Plant six items and do not tell students how many there are. Students who stop at four have learned something about audit risk too. As a data-analytics extension, ask students to export the month's journal lines and compare the first digits of the amounts with Benford's law, under which a first digit of 1 is expected in about 30.1% of naturally occurring amounts; a large departure is a prompt for enquiry, not proof of fraud.

• A supplier invoice for 1,130 (1,000 plus HST 130) entered twice under slightly different references.
• A transposition: an expense of 540 posted as 450, a difference of 90, which is divisible by 9.
• A cut-off error: goods delivered on the 31st invoiced and posted on the 1st of the next month.
• A manual journal of 9,900 posted on a Sunday by a user, just below a 10,000 approval threshold.
• A repair expense of 800 posted to equipment, an error of principle that overstates assets.
• A customer receipt allocated to the wrong customer, so one ageing balance is overstated and another understated.
• Assessment criteria: each finding supported by the document and the audit trail entry; misstatements quantified and classified as error or possible irregularity; a control recommendation for each; a summary of uncorrected misstatements.

Project 6: a multi-branch inventory case

Maple Supplies opens a second branch. The North branch buys 100 units of a product at CAD 20 on day 1 and 100 more at CAD 23 on day 10, then transfers 60 units to the South branch. After day 10 the North branch sells 100 units and the South branch 50, so the company sells 150 in total. Students track quantities by location and value the stock on a company-wide basis, treating all 200 units as one cost pool. Many ERPs keep cost layers per location instead, so the transferred units carry their own cost and the branch figures differ, which makes a good extension question.

Under FIFO, cost of sales is 100 units at 20 plus 50 units at 23, which is 2,000 plus 1,150, or 3,150, and closing stock is 50 units at 23, or 1,150. Under weighted average, the average cost is 4,300 divided by 200, or 21.50, so cost of sales is 3,225 and closing stock is 1,075. Both methods account for the full 4,300; the difference of 75 moves between profit and the balance sheet. IAS 2 permits FIFO or weighted average for interchangeable items and does not permit LIFO, a useful point to test.

Then run a stock count. The system shows 50 units in total, 40 at North and 10 at South; the count finds 48, both missing units at the South branch. Students post the adjustment (2 units at 23 = 46 under FIFO, or 2 at 21.50 = 43 under weighted average), explain which branch's figures it affects, and propose controls for transfers, such as a receiving confirmation at the destination branch and a periodic count by someone who does not handle the stock.

• Learning outcomes: apply FIFO and weighted average; track stock by location; account for a count difference; design inventory controls across branches.
• Assessment criteria: both valuations correct; location quantities reconcile to the company total; the shrinkage adjustment is correct; the control proposals are specific and practical.

A marking rubric that works across all six projects

Use one rubric for every project so that students learn what is valued, and weight it towards understanding. The weights below are a starting point; adjust them to your programme's learning outcomes.

To protect academic integrity in team or individual work, vary the data pack by student: change quantities or prices by a small amount per workspace so that every student has a different checkable total. Because most ERPs record the user and time of every posting, the audit trail also shows who did the work and when, which is useful evidence if a question of authorship arises.

• Accuracy (30%): key totals agree to the answer; journals are correct; reports reconcile.
• Process and controls (20%): documents used rather than manual journals; corrections made by reversal or credit note, not by deletion; periods closed properly.
• Explanation (30%): the memo explains the figures, the differences and the judgements in plain language.
• Professional presentation (10%): clear, labelled exports and a memo within the length limit.
• Reflection (10%): what went wrong, how it was found and what the student would do differently.

Running these projects in Skyline Nexus ERP

Each project maps to screens in Skyline Nexus ERP. For project 1, the chart of accounts is built under Fiscal Authority with a GL Code, Account Type and Posting or Heading nature per account, and control settings such as Is Control Account, Requires Cost Center and Allow Manual Posting, which lets students close control accounts to manual journals; charts can also be imported from CSV or Excel. Fiscal years are created with monthly periods, and tax rates are a name and a percentage. For project 2, once an administrator switches on the auto-post settings, final sales, purchases and payments post their journals automatically, and the stock accounting method can be set to FIFO, the IFRS-compatible choice.

For project 3, Treasury's Bank Reconciliation takes the statement ending balance, imports statements in CSV, TXT or Excel format, auto-matches items and marks others outstanding. For project 4, fiscal periods move from Open to Soft Close to Locked and a posting into a closed period is refused, and the Balance Sheet flags any difference if it does not balance. For project 5, the Audit Trail filters by user and action and shows old and new values, the Activity Log records deletions and logins, and the approval threshold for journals is a setting. For project 6, stock is held per business location, with stock transfers, a Location Wise Stock Report and Physical Stock Verification. Institutions can apply for sponsored academic access through the Skyline Nexus ERP academic access programme.