Castleton, BROC team up on taxes
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Maggie Powell (left) received help with her taxes from Castleton State College accounting students Eric Hall (center) and Jeff Alexander. Albert J. Marro / Rutland Herald |
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By Gordon Dritschilo Staff Writer - Published: March 14, 2009
A dozen accounting majors from Castleton State College are getting some hands-on training this tax season.
The students, juniors from Angele Brill's income tax class, are helping people prepare their taxes at BROC-Community Action in Southwestern Vermont and other locations in the county.
"They're learning skills I can't teach them in the classroom, like how to interview a client … how to go through receipts and W-2s and decide what's relevant," Brill said.
Brill said the students will receive a single course credit for participating. Before participating, they had to complete an online certification course with the IRS.
"It's probably 16 hours, at least," said Jeff Alexander, a 23-year-old from Phoenix, Ariz. "That's just the basic certification."
Alexander said he and Eric Hall, 20, of Orwell, were learning about Vermont state income taxes in ways that had not come up in class.
"The federal income tax return is pretty simple," he said. "Vermont has some more complicated bits, like the renter's rebate. People don't anticipate having to prepare their taxes with these things in mind. … I think on top of all the knowledge we've gained from the taxes, it helps with communication skills."
Elizabeth Eddy, BROC's community services and outreach program manager, said the organization has helped people with their taxes for a number of years now and is looking to expand the service. She said they did more than 300 returns last year with the help of volunteers from College of St. Joseph.
"We prepare simple returns," she said. "We do not do out-of-state forms and we do not do most business forms."
Eddy also said the volunteers don't actually do the taxes, but help people fill out their forms using the information they bring with them.
"Our first day, we had to send somebody away," Hall said. "We couldn't complete their return because they didn't have all their information. That was hard."
Brill said she has 12 students participating. In addition to weekday sessions at BROC, volunteers will be available from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. March 28 and April 4 at the Rutland Free Library and from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. March 19 at the Poultney Public Library.
gordon.dritschilo@rutlandherald.com
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