Tax News - Spring 2002

School of Taxation Newsletter
Spring 2002
By Dean Barbara Karlin

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GGU has a new approach to how it presents itself in print. All of our print materials now have a look like the one represented on this new paper - bold and clear, and most importantly, easily identifiable. All print materials now reflect a large "G" on a variety of bright colors. Those of you in the Bay Area will probably recognize this, as our new colorful look now graces many Bart stations and trains and bus stops.

September 11 and the events that followed sparked in many of us a renewed sense of pride and community. It also created the need in some of us to find some good news amidst all the uncertainty. This newsletter focuses on celebrating the School of Taxation. We truly have only good news to report! The year 2001 has been a banner year for our school, as you will soon see. Enjoy feeling proud that you are a part of such a prestigious and successful endeavor.

GGU has offered graduate degrees in taxation for nearly 35 years. What terrific alumni we have as a result! Nearly 4500 folks can proudly say they hold a tax degree from GGU. And as you can imagine, many are now in positions of major responsibility and representing GGU wonderfully! Next issue we will begin highlighting a special alum - itýs truly gratifying to see such successes within our graduates!

Our adjunct faculty members are the backbone of our excellence...it is they who provide the terrific practitioner orientation that makes us who we are. Where most universities who use adjunct faculty for financial reasons, we do so because they are the best equipped to offer the type of education we seek to provide. Our adjuncts teach for us because they love to teach what they know so well to students who are just like they were years before. And what makes GGU unique is that so many of our adjunct faculty are truly committed to tax education and continue to serve GGU year after year. Here are some of our longest serving adjuncts from all of our locations (Southern California up to Seattle and cyber) still teaching today after years of continuous service!

• Joe Stemach - 28 years in SF
• William Norman- 26 years in S.Cal
• Daniel Raiskin - 25 years in S.Cal.
• Martin Silver -22 years in Seattle
• Fred Sroka -21 years in SF
• Jeff Karlin - 21 years in SF
• Art Knowlson - 19 years in S.Cal.
• Belan Wagner - 19 years in Sac and Cyber
• Glenn Zahler - 17 years in SF
• Dale Lottig - 16 years in SF
• Jeff Curcio - 15 years in Sac and Cyber

The school's success is due to a complete package of the best ingredients.....fabulous practitioner teachers, a supportive business community, and wonderful alums. But we also canýt forget our students! They are a significant part of what makes us so successful. Our students can be broken into two types: those currently practicing and those who are committed to beginning a career in tax. Nearly all of our evening students work in the field during the day and muster the energy to come to class in the evening. This characteristic creates a classroom environment unquestionably enriched. Studentýs learn from each other as well as from their professor.

We are also blessed to be able to provide the opportunity for folks wishing to begin a new career in taxation. Our full-time 9-month program is now in its 4th year and has succeeded in providing to the tax community approximately 70 ready-to-go tax professionals. When entering the market after earning their MS in Taxation, they bring with them a tax-season internship experience. All who successfully complete the program have proven themselves to be valued members of the tax community.

After many down years in the mid 1990's, the continued growth of tax school enrollments the past several years is simply amazing. Not only is the School of Taxation the largest tax program in the world in terms of numbers of student, it just keeps on growing and grabbing more and more market share from our competitors. Since 1997, our school's system wide enrollments have grown nearly 12%. Even more exciting is the growth in our entry students - a terrific 22% over the same period. Wonderful!

The School of Taxation has a symbiotic relationship with the tax community - particularly with Bay Area tax firms. Our recent Meet the Tax Firms Night is just one example of our strong connection with the tax community. Representatives from 13 organizations met with students on September 21 at our San Francisco campus. Participating firms included:

• PriceWaterhouseCoopers
• Andersen
• Ernst & Young
• Deloitte Touche
• Grant Thornton
• Hood & Strong
• Burr
• Pilger & Mayer
• Armanino McKenna
• BDO Seidman
• Moss Adams
• Mowat Mackie & Anderson
• FTB
• IRS

Golden Gate University is a private university, unable to take advantage of the state subsidies available to our Bay Area competitors. As a result, the university has always been uncomfortably tuition dependent. We are very thankful for our many donors who have assisted us in our ability to provide such excellent education to our students through their charitable contributions.

Scholarship support is particularly appreciated by our career-change students, as they must use their personal funds to pay for school. This year, we were able to award scholarships to five of our very best students. A huge thanks to our scholarship donors:

• Arthur Andersen Foundation
• The Robert Shaw Memorial Scholarship
• San Francisco Tax Executives Institute
• Linda Montgomery, CPA (tax school advisory board member)

The following students were selected to be scholarship recipients as a result of the generosity of our scholarship donors:

• Ben Golden
• Jeffrey Lewis
• Jusmerya Chandra
• Masakazu Ishikawa
• Gregory Jackson

With an impressive Advisory Board, practitioner full-time and part-time faculty, and the ability to be quickly responsive to business trends and needs, GGU's School of Taxation is able to create classes that enrich our curriculum on a continual basis. This is reflected by the following new electives we developed within the past few years:

• Taxation of E-commerce
• LLC's and S-Corps: Choice of Entity
• The Corporate Tax Function
• Individual Retirement Plans and Distributions

In addition, we now have a comprehensive grouping of classes in the growing area of international taxation, all offered over the web and all popular!