This is much more than just a textbook course; it is an entire society of dedicated students who want to give back and expand their learning.

I am so happy I did VITA. I felt like we became a community, where we were all willing to help one another out whenever possible. It gave me the chance to meet not only clients from different backgrounds, but many fellow classmates that I have never met before.

After my first week of preparing clients' tax returns, I no longer viewed VITA as a class I needed to pass, but more as a job, a responsibility, an obligation to my community. Each and every week, I would show up, ready to face whatever problems may arise among my tax returns for the night.

Through my VITA experience, I deeply felt and understood the meaning of teamwork. Our weekly tax return session is completed by the greeters sitting outside the classroom to check people in, preparers who input clients’ information based on different cases, reviewers who patiently answer every single question from preparers and carefully review tons of tax returns every night, and of course by professor Leanne’s efforts to always come up with ways to help us work more efficiently, share her own knowledge and experiences in tax return projects with us and to take care of this whole project. I felt very proud to be part of the VITA team as I truly experienced how a large project was divided into each segment and how a breakdown working structure needs to be achieved by every team member’s contribution.

One of the things that made VITA special was that we worked as a team to solve tax issues every night. Although we had our individual clients for each night, many students would become involved in other student’s tax returns when issues presented themselves. This was different from any other learning experience because issues were solved by constantly interacting with each other and we never had to feel like we were alone when solving a problem.

What I thought was impactful about VITA, more so than the actual completion of tax returns, is the bonds that are built and the perceptions that are broken. I now walk around campus without judging others because I have created relationships with huskies of an array of looks and backgrounds. I actually ran into one of my clients 2 weeks ago and he remembered it was my birthday; I was so surprised and happy that he remembered that.

Being a part of VITA here at UConn has truly been an unforgettable and extremely rewarding experience for me. The experience I have gained in relation to client services and professional etiquette are extremely valuable to have reinforced prior to the beginning of my future career in accounting. I found it enriching to think that these clients are relying on me to prepare their tax return, which I learned can be such a daunting experience for them. I also was able to reinforce my teamwork and conflict resolution skills through VITA, as not every tax return was as straightforward as the next. The reviewers were a great support system for us and helped us navigate through any situations we may have encountered. In the end , VITA has been one of the most enriching activities I have been apart of during my time at UConn and I am extremely proud of the production and success that we had as a collective group.

My favorite part of the VITA program was meeting students from outside the business school. As a commuter student, I spend all of my social time with students in the accounting department. I enjoyed becoming acquainted with people from outside the department. I particularly liked meeting the international students. It broadened my perspective on the challenges they face.

VITA brings together accounting students in an environment where we work together through challenging situations, just as if we were working in a real accounting firm. Besides bonding with each other, VITA allows us to connect with the greater UConn community.

One of my clients particularly stood out in this regard and I believe some of my classmates have had similar experiences. I prepared a tax return for a student from Nigeria. A couple days later, I saw him at the recreation center playing basketball and we had a 20-minute chat there about what we are both planning on doing with our careers. Since then, I have played basketball with him a handful of times and it is always great to see him there. Ultimately, the connections made personally between preparers, reviewers, and the clients are like the way that the UConn and this program can bond with the community.

My experiences in VITA were unlike any other course I had ever taken. Its unique "learning by doing" teaching strategy was initially what made me register, but its involvement in helping the community was what ultimately made it so enjoyable.

I have made many positive connections throughout my experience in VITA. I became friends with other VITA preparers and now study with them for other accounting classes we share. In addition, my favorite part of VITA were all of my clients that I served. Each and every one of them had a unique and interesting story that I loved learning about. It was such a great experience meeting so many foreign students and workers, hearing about their home countries and experiences in the U.S., and about their future career paths. These personal connections with my clients was the most beneficial and inspiring part of VITA.

I believe this program is extremely beneficial to the university and the community at large. From a student standpoint, we gain actual experience, credits towards our CPA exam, and are offered a fun volunteering opportunity. The program is beneficial to the community at large as we are helping people who feel they would not be able to do this without us. The university also benefits because the service we provided is something that people should be proud of. Especially since I don't know many times in my life when a PhD candidate will be asking me for help! Overall, I really enjoyed my time in VITA, it was definitely a great learning experience and I met many great people.

Words cannot describe how embarrassed I'm feeling writing this, but the entire notion of wanting to help the University and community at-large was likely one of the last reasons that I considered when deciding to participate in this program. Indeed, when Leanne first came to my tax class in the Fall of 2017 to introduce us to the VITA program, nothing about this program really caught my attention. After all, when it came to service learning, there were other things on campus that I could have potentially participated in if that is really something that I wanted to do. But that was until she started talking about how students participating in VITA gain IRS certification that they can then put on their resume. It was at that exact moment that I knew I wanted to enroll in VITA. After all, as a junior heading into his final year of college, improving my resume as much as possible to increase my chances of being recruited is what all I really thought and cared about at that moment. Yes, from the very beginning, I was never really in it for the community, I was in it for myself.
But as I walked out of BUSN 106 for one last time on April 8th in my VITA shirt, the thought that I had finally achieved a certification to put on my resume never really crossed my mind, not even once. Somewhere along the course of this semester which I would describe as being nothing short of an extraordinary experience, I had stopped solely concentrating on the benefits of VITA to me. What I had instead started focusing on about this program were the benefits that it was providing to the University and community at-large. And how could I not? After all, when you work with your clients sometimes for hours on end filled with little moments of awkward silence and they still leave the room at the end of what would be an exhausting night with a warm smile and a 'thank you', you just cannot help but see the bigger picture in play. And for me, that has been without a doubt the biggest positive takeaway from this entire program.
Participating in VITA has taught me a whole lot about social responsibility as opposed to self-interest which has historically been the driving force behind a lot of the decision that I have made in the past. Beyond just learning about social responsibly through service learning, VITA has also exposed me to a ton of diversity and multiculturalism that I otherwise wouldn't have experienced to the extent that I did in VITA. I worked with clients from India, China, Ukraine, Turkey and England. And while majority of the time was spent explaining the various steps involved in preparing their tax returns, I did get to spend some time talking to them about their move to the U.S. and how does it compare to their native country while sharing my own experience of moving to the U.S. from India. Such exchanges, while irrelevant to the actual process of preparing returns, were really meaningful to me to the extent that they first and foremost served as a nice ice-breaker and secondly provided me with valuable experience in dealing with a diverse set of clients which I would without a doubt encounter in my professional career in the future. 

The benefits of this service to the University and community is obvious. It's not only a way to give back to our community and those serving our school - like graduate students, TAs, etc. - but it's such a humbling experience. I genuinely believe there's a lesson that every single person has learned from participating in VITA. And I believe there are so many students at this business school who don't see how life is like for people of other nationalities, cultures, and backgrounds. It's honestly a shock to see how much I've actually learned about the clients I've sat down with, and I don't think the students at our business school are often exposed to interacting with people like our clients. I believe this program has broadened the horizons of many of the accounting students, and that many of them have developed a greater respect for differences in people. I doubt that many of the VITA preparers/reviewers would have otherwise interacted to this extent with people like our clients.

This year was the first year I was able to use my accounting skills to create a real impact. I have had internships before where I was in charge of keeping up with ledgers and manipulating excel workbooks but I never felt like I was making an impact in other peoples' lives. VITA provided me with this new feeling of accomplishment with respect to me field of study. I think it is great exposure for any accounting major to come to the realization that their work goes beyond crunching senseless numbers. I had a wonderful time this past semester and have established a greater respect for what my profession entails. From what I have heard, no other business major has something like VITA where students would be able to apply their knowledge in the real world and create notable impact. For that I am grateful and very satisfied with my decision to have joined VITA in the first place.

One of the clients I actually served towards the end of VITA actually gave me a hug, and it was in that moment that I realized all of the time I've given this semester has truly made an impact on people. This was a challenging but incredibly rewarding experience and I'm glad to have had it.

I've learned that it's a beautiful thing to work with others for a good cause. It was a joy to bring smiles to the faces of our clients who were all very appreciative of our work. That alone, made it all so worth it.

Lastly, I'd just like to say how much of a positive experience I think VITA has on everyone involved. For us students it really is helpful to get a practical application of some of the things we learn in our
accounting classes. It's also nice for the clients that we are serving too. They obviously get their taxes done, but it's so much more than that. It provides that sense of the UConn community just helping each other out. I can't really think of another program that provides so much for everyone involved in it, and I'm happy that I was able to take part in this experience.

A lot of times when I went to VITA I was very tired and did not really feel like working, but after seeing how happy many of my clients were after I did their returns I felt really good about myself.

Also, this class was very motivating for me. Usually when I walk into a classroom, my goal from day one is to read the syllabus and figure out exactly what grades I need to get an 'A'. When I walked into VITA, the goal was not to get an 'A', but rather to help people. Typically, halfway through the semester it becomes more and more difficult to go to class because all I am trying to accomplish is getting that 'A'. In VITA, each week it did not feel like a chore to go to class because I felt I could help someone with their own life.

VITA has given me a leg up on my competitiveness in the job market, made clear by the internship interviewers who were very impressed by my participation in this dynamic program. The real-life scenarios I recounted to the recruiters showcased my transferable soft and hard skills to the workforce, and they were impressed with my tax experience at an age where most accounting work is done in the classroom. 

Throughout my leadership program or internship interviews, my interviewers were always interested in, and wanted to hear more about, my experiences in VITA, which helped set me apart from other candidates.

VITA really is an incredible opportunity for students to participate in. It is hands-on community service that allows us to apply what we learn in the classroom to real life situations, as well as learn about an entire section of tax law that is not included anywhere else in our curriculum. I talked about VITA at lunch with the managing partner of the Grant Thornton Stamford office and he was so impressed with how much I knew about foreign tax and how familiar I was getting with it. It is definitely a talking point in interviews and beyond and does stand out to employers.

It’s important to remember that while grades are important, they are not the only thing that are important when interviewing for an internship or a job. Employers give just as much consideration to what candidates have accomplished outsides of academics as they do to a student’s grade. Thus, every student has an incentive to participate in and acquire new experiences that will make him a stronger candidate for an internship or a full-time position. For those majoring in Accounting, VITA is just the kind of experience that employers want. Not only is it in a field related to accounting, but the social aspect of the program is especially attractive to firms who want their employees to continually participate in community service outside of work.

Finally, it was really beneficial for me to get some experience in the field of accounting that I was then able to put on my resume and talk to potential employers about. This came in handy especially when I was interviewing for a PwC leadership position and I had a second-round interview. The partner that was interviewing me was very interested in the VITA program that was on my resume and we talked about it for 10 minutes during the 30-minute interview. I really credit my participation in VITA and the knowledge that I gained from VITA with the reason I was accepted into this leadership program.

Another benefit I received from this experience was the respect I earned from my friends and family. Some of them could not believe 1 was filing people's taxes for them because much like me, they thought it was really difficult. In addition, another benefit 1 got was that it satisfied my volunteer hours and it looked great on my resume.

I think I can speak on behalf of both myself and fellow classmates, VITA has provided me with a strong foundation of hard and soft skills that will only help propel my career. I am proud to say that I have recently accepted an offer for a State Taxes and Audit Management internship with [a sustainable energy company with over 6,500 employees $31B in assets and operations in 24 states] this upcoming summer. I don't think I would have been given this opportunity if it weren't for the VITA program.

Looking back I see that VITA has exceeded my expectations. It did this by letting me give back to the community, which I had never had the time or opportunity to do, and it gave me experience
working on tax returns. Even if I had taken a tax class there was still a lot I didn't understand about tax returns. At VITA I was quickly taught how and what I needed to do. On top of all this, VITA also gave me something to talk about in interviews for jobs. I cannot stress how many times I was asked a question and I was able to point to one of my experiences at VITA.

Being a reviewer gave me experience with management skills that will be useful as I progress through my career.  I haven’t had many opportunities to practice my managerial abilities, especially within the context of accounting. As a reviewer, preparers looked up to me to set the tone, answer difficult questions, and guide them through the process. Having this experience helped me become more confident in managing others and will be a critical skill as I move forward in the profession.

I learned a lot through my time as a preparer, but I gained even more as a reviewer.  The biggest difference to me was having to jump into a return and familiarize myself with the case in just a few minutes versus handling the return from start to finish.  This sharpened my analytical skills and helped me focus on the key aspects of each return.

This course meets only on Tuesday nights in the first few weeks for training, then students sign up for one night per week to serve clients. Thus, students only have to attend one night per week, but StudentAdmin reflects all of the times we have rooms reserved (M/Tu/Th nights and Fri mornings). This often creates an enrollment conflict for students trying to enroll in a course that meets during one of the times we have a room.  Please fill out our VITA Enrollment Request Form and we will get back to you as soon as possible!