Students from SU’s Whitman School take taxes to the extreme

Students from SU’s Whitman School take taxes to the extremeNovember 01, 2005Amy Schmitzaemehrin@syr.edu

Students from Syracuse University’s Martin J. Whitman School of Management will compete in the PricewaterhouseCoopers xTax 2005 competition Nov. 9th from 3-10 p.m. in Room 525 of 721 University Ave.

The PwC xTax competition takes place annually at more than 25 colleges and universities across the country. Teams of five students make a 12 minute presentation, followed by 10 minutes of questions from the judging panel of PwC managers and partners. This year, the Whitman School has 12 teams competing for $1,000 prizes. The winning team has the opportunity to go to the national finals. Only five teams nationwide compete in the national finals.

“The xTax competition is very challenging,” says Randy Elder, director of Whitman’s Joseph I. Lubin School of Accounting. “As it says in the name, it is extreme. The competition gives students real-life exposure to real-world tax cases and forces them to be both well prepared and able to think on their feet.”

Typically, xTAX teams have two weeks to research an assigned high level question about an important tax issue. Teams have to determine a solution and prepare a presentation that convinces experts that their solution is the best one. Teams must consider multiple stakeholder viewpoints, collect information about alternatives and select a course of action.

For more information or to set up an interview, please contact Amy Mehringer, Communications Manager, Whitman School of Management, at (315) 443-3834or aemehrin@syr.edu.