This paper outlines the objectives of a survey that will yield information about beginning accounting students’ familiarity with spreadsheet software. After establishing the importance of this issue for accounting education in the principles courses, the paper examines previous research on the topic. The paper concludes with a synthesis of this research applied to the design of a survey form that will yield answers to two main questions. First, do beginning accounting students have access to computing resources that are sufficient to aid them in their study of accounting; and second, do these students have the knowledge and skills to use the computing resources that are available to them.