AU Accounting and Tax Training Institute deeply rooted in Auburn’s land grant tradition

It started in 1973. Auburn University began sponsoring an annual two-day tax seminar when the need was discovered to provide farm tax courses to Alabama farmers. Fundamental to the university’s land-grant mission, the courses taught tax education in regards to the unique needs of agricultural producers and landowners.

In attendance that inaugural year was George Hodge, cotton farmer, tax preparer and Auburn alum. Hodge, a 1963 graduate in accounting, has returned to the course nearly every year since. In 2016, while cleaning out his desk, Hodge found his original certificate of completion from that first tax program he attended in 1973. It is something he shared with the program director and something he treasures from his attendance at the program over 45 years. Over the years Hodge has traveled for more tax programs than football games and has seen the program itself evolve from a farm tax school to a regional leader in continuing professional education for tax preparers in the southeast.

In 2001 Auburn University’s Office of Professional and Continuing Education acquired the tax program and created the AU Accounting and Tax Training Institute. Maintaining its land-grant heritage, the program is one of 29 universities in the US that make up the Land Grant University Tax Education Foundation (LGUTEF). LGUTEF produces the annually updated National Income Tax Workbook that is used by over 30,000 tax professionals nationwide and for the Auburn University Tax seminar participants each fall. With over 2200 tax professionals attending the program each year, the AU Accounting and Tax Training Institute has moved away from tax education for farmers and now focuses on new tax legislation, current tax law trends, and ethics topics for all tax professionals. The course qualifies for 16 hours of CPE for CPAs, EAs, Attorneys, CFPs, and other tax professionals in the southeast.

Today, the AU Accounting and Tax Training Institute is the largest LGUTEF member provider of tax courses and participants attending the programs. The program now offers its nationally accredited, two-day tax seminar in 16 cities across five southeastern states including Alabama, Georgia, Arkansas, Mississippi and Louisiana. The two-day seminars provide robust training to participants with topics ranging from legislative updates to ethics. Training is provided by top-notch instructors including nationally recognized speakers, expert tax professionals and federal and state tax specialists. In addition to the two-day seminars, the institute offers one-day live seminars and online courses.

The Auburn University Accounting and Tax Training Institute is registered with the National Association of State Boards of Accountancy (NASBA) as a sponsor of continuing professional education on the National Registry of CPE Sponsors and an IRS Provider of CE for all tax professionals. Continuing legal education accreditation is also offered through the state bar associations in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana and Mississippi for attorneys completing the program.

Each year the program provides an opportunity for participants to not only meet yearly continuing education requirements, but also to receive updates on new legislation. The program drew record-breaking numbers in response to the 2018 tax reform changes, which represented the most significant changes to tax law in the United States in thirty years.

The program, which continues to expand both geographically and online, has cultivated a loyal following and fostered tradition as it brings high-quality advanced training to tax professionals.

“Tax is a long-term relationship business. For many tax preparers, the season does not simply begin in January and end in April. Instead, preparers develop lifelong relationships with their clientele. They see them as family,” Claire Twardy, OPCE Assistant Director and program developer for the AU Accounting and Tax Training Institute, explains.

When you think of Auburn University, family and tradition are two values that easily come to mind. For most, the subject of tax law may not incite these values, but for more than 45 years, the AU Accounting and Tax Training Institute has echoed these values, sowing them throughout the Southeast.