The purpose of this course is to provide a comprehensive overview of the most recent Yellow Book—the 2018 Yellow Book Revision—and its application to financial statement audits, reviews of financial statements, attestation engagements, and performance audits conducted in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards (GAGAS).

This course will provide students with an improved understanding of the GAGAS fieldwork and reporting requirements that apply to various types of GAGAS engagement. For each type of engagement that an auditor can perform under GAGAS—whether it's a financial audit, examination engagement, review, agreed-upon procedures, review of financial statements, or performance audit—this course will break down the category-specific fieldwork and reporting requirements that GAGAS auditors have to comply with.

Upon completion of this course, students will:

• identify the different categories of GAGAS attestation engagements
• recall which AICPA standards GAGAS auditors are required to follow when conducting various types of engagements that are subject to GAGAS
• recognize the fieldwork and reporting requirements that apply to each GAGAS engagement category
• differentiate among the seven quality report elements and recognize the four elements of a finding under GAGAS
• identify how the 2018 Yellow Book defines waste and abuse and an auditor's responsibility to uncover instances of waste and abuse under GAGAS
• determine the process for how government auditors can use the GAO's Green Book and the COSO model of internal control to connect internal control deficiencies to the cause element of audit findings
• recognize how report distribution requirements for internal and external audit organizations, as well as public accounting firms and audit organizations that are part of a government entity, differ in a GAGAS performance audit
• remember the concept of sufficient appropriate audit evidence and differentiate between physical, documentary, and testimonial evidence.
• identify which factors GAGAS performance audit fieldwork standards identify as making information more or less reliable

This course is most beneficial to professionals new to GAO Standards—Yellow Book who may be at the staff or entry level in organization but also for a seasoned professional with limited exposure to GAO Standards—Yellow Book.

General awareness of auditing principles